


The Beguiling of Bruce Wayne

by lucius_complex



Series: The Beguiling of Bruce Wayne [1]
Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Drama, Humor, M/M, Romance, cross-dressing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-01
Updated: 2013-04-30
Packaged: 2017-12-03 23:37:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 30
Words: 19,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/703946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucius_complex/pseuds/lucius_complex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Joker’s behaving awfully romantic for some reason, and its driving Bruce Wayne completely <em>batshit</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Door Gift

 

A/N: This fic operates on the premise that Joker somehow knows of Batman's identity. 

 

1

He felt rather than heard Alfred’s soft footfalls behind him, and squeezed his eyelids a little tighter against the encroaching interruption. 

“Master Bruce? You had a very special gift arrive this morning.”

“Alfred. Are there innocent people dying?”

“No.”

“Are there innocent people about to die?”

A second of speculative silence. “Not innocent, no.”

“Good day, Afred.” Bruce’s eyelids remained glued shut, even though his senses told him that the old butler was now standing over his bed, probably with the breakfast tray and a disapproving expression.

 Alfred could stand there for the rest of the day for all he cared.

“Indeed. Well, as you wish, master Bruce. After all...”

Bruce stiffened, a heartbeat away from the splendour of oblivion. 

“Innocent is hardly a word I’d would use to describe you. Good morning, sire.” The door quietly slipped shut behind the butler.

  
_God_ dammit.

*

Twenty four transparent heart-shaped balloons were waiting for him in the foyer, all of them half filled with some soupy, dark red liquid that chilled his heart. A riot of green and purple ribbons cascaded down, falling in ringlets that glittered with what was beginning to look like last week’s heist at Gotham’s biggest jewelry store.

 “When did this arrive?”

“A little before daybreak.”

“Card?”

“Mobile,” Alfred said drily, handing it over together with one of the soupy balloons. “Must be moving up in the world.”

He pressed dial on the only number on the phone, stomach unpleasantly clenched.

The joker's macaber voice answered on the first ring. “Well.  _Hello_ , beautiful. Didcha have a nice night out yesterday, chasing your own tail?”

“You should know,” Batman replied through gritted teeth. “yesterday’s wild goose chase had your fingerprints all over it.”

“But you love the excercise, Batsy baby, its good for you. Besides, how was i supposed to find time to prepare all this for you?”

“A lot of trouble to taunt me about my identity, Joker. Even for you.”

“Do you like it? Only the best for my Batsy.” The preen was evident in Joker’s voice.      

“Do you know what i’m going to  _do_  to you if I find any deaths linked to this-.” It wasn’t a question so much as a promise to hurt.

“Re _lax_  Batsy. Nobody died! No bombs either. I promise!”

Batman caught his butler’s gaze, who silently affirmed that nothing untoward had been heard of from the police. So far.

“See? I can be good. I want to turn over a new leaf, Batsy, just for you. Whatdaya say?”

“What do you want?” Bruce barked.

“What do  _YOU_ want?” the Joker’s reply was instant, brutal. “What does the Brucie want? Peace? Love? Solidarity? Or, but, here’s the rub.” the Joker begun to purr. “Does  _the Batman_  want the same thing as Brucie does? Hmm, does he? See, Batman’s a survivor, like me. He just wants to  _be_. And maybe your alter ego’s beginning to realise that his daytime repository might not necessarily have his best interest at heart. But look at the time, ahahhha, my second act’s coming on soon. Gotta powder my face now, darling. Give us a kiss!”

The line went dead. Eyeing the priceless mess of stolen jewelry on the floor, Bruce dropped the silent cell phone into the pile, picked up a vase, and smashed it into a wall.

“Sire? You seem to be... disproportionately disturbed by all this- from all accounts, a harmless prank to get your attention.”

“I can’t read his intentions time, Alfred. He hasn’t done anything in  _months_.”

“Anonymous deaths and mayhem  _can_ become a bit boring after awhile.”

“I keep waiting for the other shoe to fall.”

“I did warn you about getting too involved in things you don’t fully understand, Master Bruce.”

“I didn’t get involved with him, Alfred. He got involved with me.”

*


	2. Yellow Submarine

 

2

The Joker’s balloons and its trailing cascade of ribbons- now sans the obscenely expensive ornaments it came festooned with –bobbled merrily along the roof of the Batcave. If Bruce had been inclined to humour he might have thought that it made his hideout look anticipative, almost festive. There had in fact been a real organ, abeit a tiny one-  floating inside each heart-shaped rubber container, slowly swirling about like a bell in a baby rattle.  

What two dozen carved-out hearts – rabbits probably, or ferrets – could possibly mean to the Joker eluded Bruce. His skin crawled at the implications.

He had burst one of the balloons over a sink, and its contents were now on their way to one of the anonymous labs that Lucius had put together before his resignation. Commissioner Gordon had been alerted to stand by to receive the DNA samples of up to 24 potential targets- rather large scale for the Joker, but then he’s been quiet lately. His masked lackeys might have been running all over town, but the caliph himself been down in his lair, dreaming this up.

Whatever  _this_  was.                                    

Bruce harbours no illusions that the Joker would keep his identity under wraps; it was only a matter of time. From the moment the Joker had revealed the aces up his sleeves Bruce had started to slowly siphon off the bulk of his estates, setting up a ruthless and methodical system that would instantly and effortlessly destroy of any traces of his own civilian life. The most advance detonation that money could buy had been stuffed down every crevice of his penthouse and Wayne manor.

The day the Joker announced to the world whom Batman really was, Bruce Wayne would have to disappear from Gotham.  Fast. Only Batman would be left, because only Batman had any purpose.

He would be Batman. Forever. A final sacrifice for Gotham, perhaps.               

It had been telling that  _Alfred_  had been the one who expressed a lot more distress about the whole thing than him.

 

The veritable coffin he was preparing to seal himself in hardly bothered him. He had no one to account to, nobody to mourn for, who would morn for him other than Alfred, and the decision had been surprisingly easy to make.   
 _  
Too easy_ , Alfred had said with some sadness.

He’d given Alfred a choice to leave, retire into the sunset with a golden handshake that could have bought the old butler his own area code. When the old man scoffed at him, threats ensued, and then almost -begging, although that had been quickly cut short by one of Alfred’s looks.

“You don’t have to beg, Master Bruce. The day will come when I  _will_  take a nice pile of your money away and buy myself a nice submarine. But that day’s not here yet.”

“When will it be then, Alfred?”

“When I give up on your sanity.”

Bruce was shocked; the old man had seldom been so direct.

“Surely you don’t think me so susceptible.”

Alfred allowed the silence to swell as he packed for several moments. “We all think we know how far the soul’s d –“ he shook his white head and continued-“how far the  _other_  side extends. Its in our natures to suspect the man next to us of great darkness, but we think we’ve seen it all, the worst that we can do. That’s why the people on the sane side of thing are always so confident.. if the day should come when Batman loses his way to the darkness...”

“If that day should come Alfred, I’ll destroy myself.”

“Should that day come, Master Bruce, you won’t  _wan_ t to.” Alfred straightened, looked him right in the eye. “And that’s why I’ll be staying right here, Master Bruce. To do it  _for_  you.”

 “Alfred.”

“But I’d still be wanting you to pay for my submarine, sir.”

*

 


	3. Ready for my closeup

 

3

That trice-cursed Joker was on TV again.

In fact, he had managed to plaster his ugly mug on ever single satellite broadcasting through Gotham, despite the fact that not a single bomb had gone off yet. Interrupted emergency podcast flashed through every one of the thirty five screens in his downtown office, streaming live montages of the Joker waving at cameras and cop cars from the entrance of Wayne Tower.  

The cameras paned into a battered, ominous looking violin case at the Joker’s feet as newscasters vied to out-speculate each other about the calibre of explosives that probably lay within it.

“Ohhhhhahahah, an audience,” Joker finished powdering his face and blew a coy kiss at the newscasters and gawking crowd. I’m ready for my close up now, Mister Demille! Heeehehehhehehe!”

He tossed the compact over his shoulder and picked up the violin case whilst beckoning to the cameras with a white gloved hand. “Oh for –come closer! Cut an aspiring artist some slack, cant ya tell I took extra long with my make up today?”

A loudspeaker throbbed to life from the roof of a police car. “Freeze, Joker. Drop the case!”

Joker cocked his head. “Are you sure? I mean, the contents are kinda… fragile. Look, I’ll even show ya.”

Gasps as the latches clicked. The crowd retreated on itself; live cameras flinching away from the Joker with all angles awry.

Helpless with rage, Bruce cursed the state of the art bullet-proof sanctuary he was stuck in- now thankfully barred against the anxious squawking noises that Wayne security and the boardmembers are making, while twenty four stores below his arch nemesis was extracting a – a –

Disbelief made his jaw drop.

  
_God_ \- BLAST that infernal clown.

*

Joker crooned in delight as he lovingly slid a lime green electric fiddle on his shoulder and gave it an experimental caress. He stopped, looking out at the gaping crowd as if noticing them for the first time.

“An explanation is appropriate, yes? Yes. Well this is for my Bruce. He’s got this big balcony, I’m sure - up  _there-_  to somewhere..” Joker gestured vaguely at the sky. “And I’m gonna give him, well-”

A tissue found its way to the Jokers nose. “I’m  _poor,_  you see. So I’m going to give him- a SERA _nade_.”

The cameras suddenly became  _very_  enthusiastic as the Joker burst into a frenzy of song.

“O my darling, o my darling, o my  _darrrrrr_ ling Clementine-”

*

“What do you expect to be able to extort from Mister Wayne?” one of the more foolhardy reporters pressed. 

The screeching died an abrupt death, leaving a silence that was impossibly, more disturbing than his playing had been.

“Extort?” The Joker whispered, patting down his jacket to extricate a single action Jericho which he swung lazily on one gloved finger. “Why are you people _always_  wanting to turn a perfectly good love story into something so sordid?”

The whirling circle of cameras were starting to retreat again, so joker hurriedly tried to explain.

“See. I’m not hurting anyone. See? Just little old me, standing here by my lonesome, with nobody dead. It s safe, Brucie. Safe to come out and pla _aaay_.” The green fiddle resumed it hideous screeching.

From somewhere in the safetly of the crowd one of the police officers found half a ball and shouted out; “Freakshow!“

“But what a show it will be! Except I really need a second act,” Joker dropped his violin and peered into a camera. “Helloooo! How’s the view from the batcave? I hope he’s watching this, I really do.”

“Miste- Mister Joker-”

“Yeeesss?” The clown was all coyness.

“Its highly irregular to, that is for you to-”

“Well sweetheart, they  _do_  say that about love. Highly. Irregular. Feel my heartbeat, do.”

The reporter scrambled away before the Joker could grab her hand. “What would you say to Bruce Wayne if you could see him now?”

“ _Say_! Why  _say_  when we could  _do_?”           

Incredibly, the crowd actually tittered. Bruce grimaced in disgust as he surveyed the sway he Joker was holding over his audience. It was time for Batman to put a stop to this sideshow.

“And what would you ask Mister Wayne to do with you?” snickered another journalist too stupid to know he was being lead by the nose.  

Joker considered this question at leisure, one finger tapping at his chin. “What  _do_  ask for from the boy who has everything?” His face brightens, and he sticks his face into the camera. “A kiss! Ah but not from  _you_ , Bruceie boy. No offence intended. You’re a little... meek. We like the Batman more, yes we do. Ask him to come out. We  _know_  he’s here- listening. Its really not fair to only let the Bat come out at night.”

Bruce had seen enough.

*


	4. Darkly Handsome

 

 4

Batman was clipping open the window grills to the roof that shaded the Wayne Tower compound just as the Joker had finished taking his obscene bow and as about to strike up another song. He swore he could have heard a smattering of applauses from somewhere, unfeasible as that must be.

Meanwhile, the Jokers theatrical and admittedly powerful vocals struck up its balladry flourish: his violin was an echoing chorus of a dozen drowning cats.

“ _Sing a song of sick pence,_  


_A pocket full of bombs;_

_Four and twenty black bats,_

_Went in dem ballons! (Wasn’t easy you know getting em in.)”_

Batman’s heart sank as the lyrics registered, and worked the remaining grills faster.

_“...And when their hearts were opened,_

_The bats begin to SHRIEK!_

_Say, isn’t this a tasty treat to set before a Wayne?_

_The Wayne was in the pent-houseeee-”_

The last bar gave way with a vicious kick, and Batman leaped onto the low incline and swung himself on the flat edge overlooking the massive fountain below.

“Joker!” 

The joker jumped violently away and peered up onto the roof, cooing. “Oh Batsy, you  _came_. I’m sorry for the poor welcome but we were all waiting for Bruce... but no matter!” Joker winked “One can  _hardly_  tell the difference between them- well - the Bruce is tall, dark, and handsome, and the Batman is daark, tall, and... dark. And handsome- but in a dark, rodent-like way.” He looked Batman up and down, nodding. “Darkly handsome.”

Once again in the crowd there was a smattering of laughter; Batman could hear it audibly now. His head swivelled slowly over the crowd, his mouth tightening under the cowl’s burning eyes until the crowd fell silent, uncertain.

Joker of course, had no qualms cutting across such meek intimidation tactics, and his violin picked up its childish tune again.

_“So...The Wayne was in the penthouse,_

_Pacing round and round;_

_His batsuit’s in the caaaavernnnn,_

_Deep deep underground!”_

“Joker” he warned, loosing all patience

_“And when his secret’s in the open, the bat begins to CRY-”_

“ENOUGH!” Batman roared, and stepped over the roof, landing directly in front of the Joker and keeping his back to the gasping crowd.

The joker’s startled, his fiddle crashing to the ground as he raised gloved hands to his mouth. “Whooooops! Ahh hehheehhehehhehe!” Abruptly, his full, baritone voice suddenly became as light as whispering wind as he slid up to his masked nemesis and smacked his lips in greeting.

“Well  _finally_. Your response time’s really lagging, Batsy dear.”

“Time to wave goodbye to the cameras, Joker.”

“I mean, you really shouldn’t start to let yourself  _go_  like this. Should I pick up a bat whistle for next time?”

‘You’ll be picking up your teeth,” Batman growled, and landed a fist into the Joker’s open mouth.

*


	5. The Savage Bat

 

5

The collision of a clenched, kelvar-encased fist had the Joker flying like a jack-in-the-box, and he landed with a sickening crack against the fountain, narrowing avoiding the scramble of retreating reporters.

Several somebodys screamed. Batman didn’t pay any attention to them.

“That’s gratitude for you,” The Jokes said conversationally as he spat teeth. “First time we’ve laid eyes on each other in _months_ , and not one thank you for the pretty trinkets. They cost a pretty penny too, or so I was  _tol-_ umph”

He didn’t manage to finish, because Batman had hauled him up by the shirt collar and was herding him away from the hungry clicks of cameras.

The Joker stumbled as he was shoved. “Of course I knew you’d return it like the good billionaire bat you are, but I did hope that you’d have kept a little something for yourself.” He huffed as he attempted to straighten his tie. “As evidence of my affection for you.”

 “You can demonstrate that by staying put behind bars”

“You don’t like my serenade,” Joker sulked. “I thought music was supposed to sooth the savage bat.”

Incensed, Batman raised his fist again. “I’m going to  _pound_  you through -

“The mattress?”                                                             

That  _sick_ bastard.

“A fucking STAKE!” Batman bellowed, following up with another vicious right hook. He had to stop the sting of the Joker’s salacious taunts, the way each syllable seemed to slither so effortlessly under his armour and pierce his self control; making him feel like the only way he could get rid of them was by peeling his own skin off.

Somebody cried  _oh my god_  from the crowd, but Batman tuned it out.

“Hehehehe. Ah no ah, don’t, hehehehehe Bruce, dearie, don’t, heheheheeh! HA! HA! HA! HA!”

The Jokers thrilling laughter broke into a thousand shards around him, covering him with invisible cuts.

White hot rage seethed in his stomach, sinking like a fog over his head and casting a pall over everything else. Only the Joker stood out, a flagrant, taunting target. He moved like an automaton, following the Joker around as he shrunk and slinked away.

“BruceBruceBruceBruceBruce” The Joker chanted. “Bruce, ah no, ah HEHEHEHEEHEHE BRUCE! BRUCE! BRUCE!!!”

“ _SHUT_ UP!” Batman roared, and kneed him, followed by a head butt. Still the Joker screamed his name like a penance in between each punch.

“BRUUUCEEEEEEEEEE! BRUCEEEEEEEEEEEE”     

It didn’t occur to Batman to question why the purple monster wasn’t fighting back. His whole awareness had narrowed down to the giddy realisation that every time he hit the Joker, some of the coiled tension within subsided. He punched that pasty face again, and again, and again, and it felt good, almost like a repetitive exercise; the body releasing its grip on anxiety and slipping into a zone of intense, pure absorption.

Batman found that in that zone, he was almost in high spirits, until the Joker spoilt it all by leaning forward and whispering through blood-clotted lips, the humour in his tone damming and incontrovertible-

“ _Glad to be of service.”_  


_*_


	6. Homophobe

 

6

Almost incoherent with rage, Batman pulled his fist back again and this time, a row of short, knife-sharp blades protruded against his knuckles. The Joker’s eyes widen in surprise with something approaching awe as he beheld its glittering beauty.

“You  _did_  service me with some good ideas, you psychopathic scumbag. To turn back on  _yourself_.”

The Joker smiled up at him in invitation as Batman tightened his grip to deliver the final blow-

-until a handbag flew through the air and wacked him on the shoulder.

_“Stop it!”_

_“You monster!”_

These words and a fury of cries jarred him back to real life. The dark knight dropped the Joker and spun around, bewildered, unable to process the censor for that it really was. The purity of the moment was gone, replaced by angry voices.

The woman had throw the handbag strode forward, holding up her reporter’s mike like a cudgel she was about to trash him with. “You big bully! He just wanted to meet Wayne!”

Joker pulled himself to his knees, shuddering violently. Blood dripped from the mess that was the Joker’s forehead, dripping into his eyes and trailing over his smeared cheeks like he had been crying blood. The nauseatingly blond news anchor came dangerously close to the Joker and knelt beside him.

Batman made to stop her, but accusing stares of the crowd rooted him dumbly to the spot.

“Mister Joker? Are you all right?”

“Brucebrucebrucebrucebruce-“ chanted the Joker, swaying from side to side like a pendulum. His whole being seemed to have turned inward, into himself.

“Somebody call paramedics!”

“Gotta him to a hospital!”

“The only place he’s going,” Batman cut in irately, “is back to the birdhouse.”

This time it was an old lady who stuck a finger into his chest. She had to stand on tiptoes and stretch, but her voice was like a sledgehammer; “The first time in his life the Joker’s been harmless and you beat him to a pulp! What kind of monster are you?”

He couldn’t believe it. Had the public really forgotten who the Joker really was, all over a two-penny bit tune?

“Mebe guys like you  _make_  guys like him-” one beligerant man said, spitting on the road in a show of contempt. “Keeps you in the business, huh, getting to going around beating people up as you please.” Batman was forced to clench his fist against the impulse to acquire a new punching bag.

 Meanwhile the opportunistic Joker had suddenly turned beseeching eyes on the blond resporter. “Are they bringing him yet?” he asked. “I’ve been.. I’ve been waiting here really long,” his voice dropped to a whisper, “-and its starting to  _hurt_.”

“Oh  _poor_  thing” cried the blond bimbo, her kohl-rimmed eyes filling with tears and not smudging one bit, the well-prepared  _bitch_.

As Batman observed the proceedings, chest heaving, he suddenly became aware of the how it must look to stand over his bloodied nemesis, an image of power, immolate rage, and cold control. He stumbled backwards, turning blindly away, feeling his chest constricting.

Fleding the scene, he felt certain that he heard somebody mutter the word ‘homophobe’.  


*


	7. Porridge Logic

 

  
7

“The porridge will congeal, Master Wayne,” Alfred chided as he entered the dining hall, “but the dazzling use of logic might alert you to the fact that the newspapers will still be there- after breakfast.”

“Front cover today, Alfred. I think we’re making good progress, don’t you think?”

“Indeed. I noted progress also in channels two, three, six, twenty-four through to twenty seven, and-”

“I get your point,” Bruce interrupted dryly, followed by a grimace. 

“I really screwed up this time, Alfred. Beating Joker to a pulp on front of national TV.”

“Beating the joker to a pulp  _without_  due cause on national TV, sir.”

“ _Do_  remind me: whose side are you on again?”

Alfred discarded the untouched coffee and poured from a fresh pot. “The side which actually employs the use of one’s mental faculties, sir. Brains, rather than brawn.”

His butler’s words had him wincing, and Bruce picked up his coffee cup to hide it. “At least in their haste to tar and feather Batman, nobody’s notice the Joker’s little expose.”

“Did you not see the telly recaps in the Batcave? Nobody could make head or tail the Joker’s lyrics but you, sir. He was baiting you all along. And you took it.”

His spine slithering down the dinning chair a little more, Bruce sighed. “Sometimes I think that I’d almost be happy when it’s all out in the open and we’re back on even footing again.”

 He could tell it wasn’t the right thing to say when Alfred’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, out with it. “

“Why, I wouldn’t  _dare_  to presume.”

“Only because you’d much rather wait for it all to go to hell to say ‘I told you so’.”

Alfred harrumphs. “Your decision to kill off Bruce Wayne, does it occur to you that it is also very likely what the Joker wants?”

Bruce snorted. ‘The only person the Joker wants is Batman.”

“Exactly.”

“What  _are_  you trying to say, Alfred?”

Alfred begun to walk away with the tray. “All I’m saying, Master Wayne’s, aside from the fact that for a very smart man you can be as blind as a bat-” The tall drawing room doors swung open as he looked back, “-Is the fact that you’re about to make the Joker’s wildest dreams come through.”

_Its all going according to plan_   


Bruce was left staring at the closed doors, whilst familiar words resurfaced and echoed a hundred unpleasant implications in his head.

 

*


	8. News with substance

 

8

 

Bruce entered the media room just in time to hear his usually pokerfaced butler chortling in front of the TV screen, and was immediately seized by intense curiosity.

 

“Turn that up, will you?”

 

“Oh, my  _pleasure_ , sir.”

 

The voice on the screen cackled as it was tuned up, then turned to the smarmiest drawl Bruce has ever heard, expounding on something he couldn’t quite believe he was hearing.

 

  
_‘-I would say so no,’_ _the smug voice was saying. ‘Coupled by the death of his parents at the hands of the criminal class, the chances of him returning the affections of an Arkham-bound inmate would close to nil-’_  


 

  
“Why is this drivel being aired on a 24-hour news channel?” Bruce asked irately.

 

“I don’t think these days substantial news necessarily means news with substance, sir.”

 

_‘-for now, and the Joker’s certainly set his sights high with this one! But hasn’t Gotham City’s favourite First Son always had a bold streak about him? With his ambiguous sexuality and his tendency to rewrite the rules-‘_

 

The self-satisfied drawl cut in again before the interviewer could finish:

 

  
_‘Perhaps, perhaps, but, just_ look _at the sort of thing that the man goes for- fast cars, beautiful women, ostentatious displays of spending, planes, polo… all calculated to awe and inspire, but only within narrow confines. While his lifestyle is what one might describe as excessive, it’s hardly deviant. No, not by any stretch of the word. I don’t think that Mister Wayne will be able to tolerate any form of deviancy, bisexual or otherwise, whereas the Joker’s very ration d'etat, the function which he sees himself encompassing would be to reject the normal and embrace-“_  


 

“The whole city’s gone  _mad_ , Alfred.”

 

“One must admit that your besotted has well-timed his comic relief to coincide with the sudden lack of petty crime. Gotham is bored, which makes you the elected eight o’clock entertainment.”

 

Bruce’s thoughts however, had derailed at a particular word. _“Besotted?”_  


 

“Smitten, if you prefer. Although there’s really no accounting for taste amongst the criminally insane.”

 

“This is Gotham city, Alfred. We’ll never be  _lack of petty crime_.”

 

“Dear me, did the absence of sirens blaring on the streets keep you awake? I found the silence rather deafening.”

 

“Batman finds that suspicious.”

 

“I’d thought Batman would find that  _boring_.”

 

_“Alfred-”_

 

“In any case, you do make for a very stylish eight o’clock dialogue, Master Bruce.”

 

“I’d rather watch Mexican soap operas,” Bruce muttered.

 

“If you mange  _find_  any, sir. I don’t think this city has ever been so interested in ‘current events’ since Gotham’s first son came back from the dead and turned the town into his own personal playground.’

 

_“-Do you think that there could be somebody out there somewhere who could finally tame the Joker and turn him away from a life of crime?-_

 

_-Well, my professional opinion is that such changes are about as likely as the sun never rising again. But if they do get together I’m certainly not going to complain. God knows, at least it means that Bruce Wayne would finally be doing something for this city. Even if it’s not in the way any of us would have ever envisioned.“_

 

Alfred began to chuckle discretely again. “Certainly a cautionary tale for any playboy billionaire to take to heart.”

 

“Where  _is_  that confounded remote?”

 

  
_-Thank you, Doctor. And that was Doctor Hertz from the Center of An-_    

 

*click*

 

  
_-We think its romantic-,_  cooed one of the interviewees with her friends giggling insanely behind her.

 

*click*

 

_-The joker deserves a chance at love, same as all of us. I mean, meybe the lack of love is why he turned out the way he did-_

 

_*click*_

 

_-as long as he’s not hurting anybody, who he wants to sing to, or send flowers to, or whatever, is nobody’s business but his own, and I don’t see why a vigilante like the Batman has to-_

 

_*click*_

 

_-it is my professional opinion that the Joker, in expressing such sentiments for a similarly masked marauder-_

_*click*_

 

_-I love you Bruce Wayne! I love y-_

 

_*click*_

 

_-mi corazón tendría la forma de Batman un Joker zapato-_

 

With a look of pity, Alfred gently took the remote away from his employer’s stunned hands, switched it off, and cleared his throat.

 

“There’s always the DVD, sir.”           

 

*

 

 

 


	9. Back to two

 

  
9

Cutting through the crisscrossing lines of lights, Batman landed lightly on the ledge of the GPD roof, his cape shuddering and settling around him like a ghostly shroud.

A moment later, the newly appointed Commissioner stepped out of the pool of shadows he had been quietly waiting in. He tossed Batman a wrinkled envelope.

“Mob’s been eating itself,” he said, nodding at the photos that Batman extracted. “That’s Falcone’s favoured nephew sporting a sudden absence of thumbs.”

“Internal justice?” Batman rasped.

“You’d think so. Except that six of Maroni’s men were also sporting hand bandages. The same number that coincided with that isolated shoot up on 66th.”

“Their faces were unmarked?”

“Not a scratch. Its him though. I know it is, I just don’t know  _why_.” He looked as crumpled as ever, hair and clothes liberally streaked with grey. “That Bruce Wayne thing that been brewing though- you might want to keep an eye out on him.”

“What about him?” Batman said dismissively.

Gordon raised an eyebrow. “You mean  _besides_ the fact that he’s  _t_ he Joker’s latest, very public, target-”

“The man’s a waste of space. Hardly innocent.”

“Who amongst us really are? In any case, the over-confident ass has rejected all offers for protection. Seems to think that staying holed up in that ivory tower of a penthouse is going to keep the Joker out when he wants in. And since its  _Wayne_  we’re talking about, we’ve no access- to anything.” He looked at Batman out of the corner of his gaze. “Its not exactly archetypal, but I thought you might want to knock some sense into him. See what the clown’s trying to get out of him.”

“I’ll look into it.”

“Wayne has access to more money and potential weapons of mass destruction than anyone in this hemisphere. Maybe both.”

“You actually think he’ll-” the dark knight trailed off, utterly at loss for words. Hearing from the press was one thing, but hearing it from Gordon? He shuddered at the implications.

“Who knows? City seems to think so. I don’t presume to know what passes for thoughts in that guy’s head.” Gordon muttered distastefully. “A bored playboy is a dangerous playboy.”

Batman thought the conversation was getting surreal enough, even for his taste.

“I never congratulated you, Commissioner.”

Gordon winced. “Wish you of all people wouldn’t call me that.”

“It’s nothing you don’t deserved.”

  
_‘Please_.” The commissioner didn’t look at him. “Look at the price. I watched the last one  _die_.”

“You couldn’t have stopped it.”

Gordon lit a cigarette and leaned against the broken batsignal. “Barbara and the kids have moved out. Real impressed with the fancy promotion, she was. Told me that she wasn’t prepared to follow the back of my coffin a second time.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well. Lets see if the ‘commissioner’ can protect his city better than he protected his family.”A bark of self-depreciating laughter. “Perhaps I do deserve it.”

  
_“Don’t_  think like that.”

“Don’t know if I can.” Gordon said. “Funny, you don’t feel how tired you are until there’s a lull.”

A frisson of fear went through Batman- he knew that the Joker had succeeded in destroying Harvey Dent. Broken him to pieces.

But had he also succeeded in.. were there cracks starting to form in..

_No._

“You can and you will,” Batman retorted aggressively. “ Because there’s no choice. You’re the best this city has, so it’s upon you to be that best.”

“Doesn’t seem to need it so much lately.”

Batman stayed silent, so Gordon exhaled his lungful of nicotine and said; “Watch’s been quiet.”

“To get your guard down.”

“Naw it just makes me more jittery. The rest of them” he gestured at Gotham “might have forgotten what he’s capable of, what he _did-”_  Another breath full of nicotine, as if it was a lifeline. There was a quiet anguish in Gordon’s low voice that ventured beyond the personal, hinting at open wounds and loss and raging guilt.

At the brief, elating time when there had been  _three_.

At Harvey Dent.

“ _We_  won’t forget.” Batman said grimly. A promise, wrought into every word.

_“Or forgive.”_

*

  
 


	10. Out to do him

10

  
“I’m sorry. I never thought it’d be so hard to get into my own restaurant.”

  
The smile on his date was as luxurious and as lovely as the dead mink he had earlier helped her remove. “Oh I don’t mind. I’m used to the cameras.”

  
 _I bet that’s why you choose this place._

  
Bruce smiled mechanically. “Somebody’s got to help the reporters earn a living, eh?”

  
Her laughter was husky and dry as she fingered the lapels of his jacket. “Why, Bruce. How dutiful of you.”

  
“We all do our bit for the city,” Bruce said smoothly as he waved the maître’d away pulled out her chair himself. He had chosen The Providence as venue for the night’s decadent playboy dinner. Converted from an ancient cathedral that Urban Planning had almost torn down, Bruce had had the building restored to its original ecclesiastical features, at a cost which ensured that The Providence, for all its Michelin stars and private-listed guest, would never break even.

  
“You’re a riot. Brave as well, to be out and about considering recent events.”

Bruce’s answer was to ghost his breath over the nape of her neck and mummer, “The lure was irresistible.”

Her breathy laughter tinkled like bells over him, yet for some odd reason it was the memory of the Joker’s over-loud chuckles that filled his head. She pursed her lips when he walked to his own seat, frowning.

“Regretting your decision now that you’ve had a chance to reconsider?”

“Never.” A gallant kiss of fingers, and she was smiling again. “I’m more afraid of how I’m going to see you again after you fly off tomorrow morning.”

“I’m sure your pet psychopath can keep you entertained with hide and seek games until I return again,” she purred as she perused the menu.

“Yeah. Well. That psychopath’s really out to do me in.”  
 _Or just to do me._

  
Bruce blinked; he couldn’t believe that he had actually thought that.

“Why, such a rich variety of admirers you draw to yourself, Mister Wayne.”

Bruce raised a rueful brow; “Ah yes. From the income tax department especially.“

Over her throaty laughter, he added, “I don’t know about the variety though. The only difference I can see between an accountant and a psychopath criminal is that the accountants will kill you slower and with less sense of humour. They should call it taxidermy; the way they come after my hide. Did I tell you, the other day some little toady fro- ”

Just then, a machine-gunshot went through the vaulted ceiling, and a sonorous, sing-song voice announced:

“Good evening, ladies and gentle-man!”

  
*


	11. Hello, beautiful

11 

  
A phalanx of clown-mask filled into the room; an obscene show of numbers that more typical of the mob than the Joker’s minimalist style. The atmosphere dropped rapidly, became chilled, acquiring that tense, shaking calm that comes before hysteria breaks out.   


  
Joker stepped forward almost regally, having traded in his purple waistcoat for a red ball gown to suit the occasion. His make-up was...

Different. Startlingly so.

The usual clown lips had been reduced into the obscene caricature of a feminine pout. His dirty-green hair had been permed into curls; even the white paste that covered his face had been replaced with a finer, more chalk like substance. Rouge slashed his cheekbones, the tar-smeared skull holes around his eyes were conspicuously absent. Instead, they were kohl lined with ends extended into a tapered brushstroke.

The only items that remained the same was the conspicuous white gloves he always wore. A machine gun was tucked under one arm, as if it were a clutch.

The man in the red ball gown sashayed gaily to the centre of the room. “This here tonight, is in fact, not a raid. So you may rest easy in the knowledge that even though you forgot to reinsure that  _faabu_ lous choker tonight, there’s  _plleeenty_  of time to do it. Tomorrow.”

Heads shrivelled towards Bruce, all eyes begging him to give himself away. He ignored them and sat in the shadows, observing the loud silence of A-listers, judges and elected officials. Nobody was dumb enough to speak out- the Joker having proven, incontrovertibly, that he now ran this city.

“I just  _said_ ,” the Joker’s mockingly solicitous voice had dipped dangerously low, “that this not a raid. Come on, people, put a _smiiiile_  on those faces.”

Another round of gunshots rang through the hall. “I said LAUGH!”

And just like that, every intellectual, every big shot lawyer or CEO or head of state and their wives or mistresses- everyone in the room laughed. Without exception.

Joker picked up his skirts and swished from one table to another inspecting the occupants with a critical eye. “You’re not laughing,” he said solemnly, placing both hands on one man’s shoulders and squeezing.

His victim nearly keeled over from fear. “It-its Wayne you want! He’s over there!”

“Why thank you. Everybody loves a snitch. A snitch in time saves lives!” He touched the barrel of his gun to the sweating, shaking forehead. “Now. Take a deep breath, snitchman. And _laugh_.”

Hard sobbing broke out instead, and the pitiful drip-drip of urination.

Joker shrieked and jumped back in distaste, hurriedly examining his skirt. “You don’t pee on a  _lay-dee’s_ dress, you animal! That’s just, waaaay  _too_  kinky, even for me.”

And he winked winningly at the trembling man, who responded with a watery chuckle.

“Laughing at last! Doesn’t that make you feel better? Now get lost, all of you,” The machine gun tore through the ceiling again. “And change your  _pants_ , pops!”

The hall vacated quickly, leaving a surreal stillness that was exacerbated by the hallowed feeling of the ecclesiastical columns and candlelit chandeliers.

The Joker smacked his lips as he approached the only remaining diners in the restaurant, burning eyes raking Bruce with a salacious once-over.

“Well.  _Hello_  beautiful,” Then he turned to his date and looked right through her.

“Get lost, ugly. You’re in my seat.”

*

 


	12. Some people have no class

 

12                     
                                                                                                                                                               

His date was pale with fear, and to her credit, stiff with a semblance of outrage. She looked at Bruce, who warily nodded for her to go.

“No hard feelings, love, heh heh.”

The frigid look she gave the Joker before walking out made even the madman wince and raise his hands.

“Really, some people have no class.” The Joker muttered to himself as he sat down primly on her vacated seat.

 Bruce raised his eyebrows as he watched the Joker take his time adjusting his voluminous skirt into fussy little folds all around him. He briefly wondered if that was glitter he saw highlighting the Joker's bare shoulders. The clown’s new look was unsettling tonight, even for Bruce’s exceptional tolerance. From this distance, Bruce would see that the fake lashes trashing over his cheeks like ragged moths.           

‘So. Our first date. This is good. Best restaurant in town. Did you miss me?”

Bruce leant back and crossed his arms. “How can I miss you if you won’t go away?”

“You know. It’s really hard to get in touch with you. You don’t wear the jewellery I send you, you don’t attend your own parties, I mean, it’s just so hard to get your attention.“

“A simple phone call would have sufficed.”

I don’t even  _know_  where you go at night. What’s a poor girl to do?” the Joker lamented, his Egyptian-painted eyes wide and catlike as he beckoned the maître’d over. “I’ll have whatever he’s having. And, er, chocolate sauce, sprinkles, and crêpes.”

“And when would sir-  _madam_ , my apologies” the maître’d hurriedly stressed to amend his flaw; “-like to have his, ah, sweets served?”

“When we eat, of course!” He smiled coyly at Bruce again, tilting his head in that disconcertingly ingénue manner to elucidate, “Comfort food.”

“Very good, madam.”

“And for desserts, I’ll have him. I mean, whatever he’s having.”

“ _Very_  good, madam.”                                                              

“So where were we? Ah yes. I’m just suggesting that we start to com-mu-ni-cate in a different way. Play nice for a change. You think I can’t play nice?”

“I’d rather break all your bones and be done with,” Bruce replied sweetly.

“See, this is why a girl’s always gotta come prepared. You just never know when a man will try to- take advantage.” Looking triumphantly self-satisfied, the Joker slammed a cell phone on the table.

“Where?” Bruce bit out tersely after a split second of silence. 

“Narrow it down yourself, Batsy! Not many places would be filled with  _in-no-cent_  people at this time of night.”

His mind flew as he considered and discarded options and escape plans, eyes searching the painted face across him for hints. The Joker ignored him, clapping his hands, almost bouncy as he watched the parade of trays arrive from the kitchen.

“ _What_  do you want?”

“Uh. Dinner?” Joker said, blinking, as if wondering where Bruce had suddenly left his brains. “Oh stop. Worrying. You’re always. Wor-ry-ing.” He tapped a gloved finger on the cell phone. “If you want it so much just  _ask_  and I’ll  _give_  it to you- after-  _desserts_.” He said ‘desserts’ licking his lips, as though he was anticipating honey from the heavens.

Bruce watched the Joker tip the contents of his dinner plate onto his crêpe and smoother it with chocolate sauce and sprinkles. Then he proceeded to peel off his gloves, finger by finger.

His fingers were pale and covered with what looked like the old scars of a few thousand paper cuts, raising like tiny wrinkles on parchment paper. The Joker had intriguing hands; hands which possessed none of the restless, quivering quality of the insane, hands that seemed bizarrely young, that were kept fastidiously clean. 

They were most certainly  _not_  the hands of a madman.

“Oooh ohh, I’m going to  _enjoy_  this.”

“At least if I can’t kill you I can wait for diabetes to finish the job,” Bruce narrowed his eyes as he watched the Joker eat his messy meal with an abandoned relish that no grown man, makeup or otherwise, should.

It was... obscene.

Looking away, he cleared his throat and asked dryly, “Why don’t I just keep you swimming in a chocolate vat year around and you stop treating this city like some sort of playground.”

The Joker was clearly having a hard time resisting the urge to cackle and break his ‘lady’ persona, tears of mirth was actually pooling at the corners of his painted eyes.

“Did my big, rich boyfriend just offered to build me my own Willy Wonka?”

“With electric fencing.” Bruce promised, his smile showing teeth.

*


	13. So listen

 

13

Dinner continued apace, and Bruce continued to wonder how a person like the Joker- if one could even make such a direct association with humanity- could look almost pretty and positively hideous at the same time, attracting and repealing in equal measure.

The lack of a painted grin tonight meant that the scars raised more visibly against his painted skin, jarring and revolting. Yet he remained oddly pretty, his eyes engaging.

He had a talent for creating cocktails, Bruce decided. An intuitive grasp for mixing intention and artlessness, cold calculation and random madness, all weaved into one majorly messed-up chaos theory.

The Joker caught him staring and ducked his head in a pretend blush. He looked breathlessly around, clasping his hands in a show of mock demureness. “So what happens now in fancy places like this? Dance?”

“I think not.” Bruce replied cooly.

“Oooh. Very manly and assertive.”

“You’ve emptied the room of hostages-”

“I-”

“-and desserts hasn’t been served yet, so you can’t kill the cook. And believe me, at The Providence, you don’t want to miss the desserts.”

Joker thought about it, lips smacking “Here’s the- here’s the deal. If I can get you to laugh, no look, if I can get you to laugh at something I say, then I get my spin around the floor.”

“You can  _try_ ,” Bruce drawled in a deliberately bored voice.

“You really don’t find many things funny, do you? The trick is to keep an open mind, that’s what I always say to my guys.” Joker waves a negligent hand at the circle of masked guards that had been standing guard unobtrusively against the walls, still as graves. “They’re not really  _my_  guys, by the way.  _Don’t tell anybody_.”

“You took the mob’s.” Bruce shook his head incredulously. This clown really was suicidal, the way he went around baiting anything that had a remote chance of biting back. Unfortunately for Bruce, he suddenly found it quite funny as well.

“Uh.  _Borrowed_. I  _borrowed_  the mob’s. Not that they were very concerned with the distinction, you know. Maroni was... uh, kinda pissed.”

Bruce couldn’t help it, he almost smiled. Almost.

“So I told him: you really need to keep an open mind about things. And he said, all angry-growly like,  _MAKE_ me open minded. So I said ok, sure. Except that after that, his brains kept falling out...”

The Joker paused dramatically for laugher. “No? Ok. Ok, you’ve got  _stan_ dard _s._ Mussnt mess with _the standards.”_ His voice fell into a whisper as he nodded. “Is what drew me to you in the first place, ya know. Nobody else has it in this hell hole, ‘cept you and me.”

“Give me that cell phone.” 

“Ask me again after desserts. So, listen. Two handsome men are drinking at the bar on top of the Empire State Building. The first handsome man leans over and tells the second handsome man; ‘you know this building is so high that if you jump over the edge the draft will blow you right back up.’ 

Now the second handsome guy- and he’s darkly handsome, like you, and he’s the sceptical sort. Like you. So he says ‘prove it’. They go over to the side of the building, where the first handsome man gives the second handsome man all his makeup to hold, just in case, and then he jumps over.” 

Bruce frowned and opened his mouth, but the Joker hushed him and continued: 

“The man starts falling ten, twenty, thirty stories, then slows down, and suddenly starts  _slow-ly_  floating back up again, as if he was being carried by a cloud. And eventually he gets back on the roof where the second handsome guy is shouting ‘That was incredible, hold this, I’m going to try too!’ Off he jumps, and goes down ten, twenty, thirty, forty... sixty, seventy, one hundred and eleventh stories, until- splat.  _Pavement art._  

And then the bartender walks over to the first handsome guy with the bill and says ‘you know Superman, you’re a real  _asshole_ when you’re drunk.’ 

Bruce broke into a surprised chuckle, which quickly turned into a cough. 

“You laughed!” the Joker crowed, banging the on table with glee.

*


	14. Scheherazade

 

14

 

There was no point in denying it.

“Let’s get this charade over and done with,” Bruce muttered, schooling his face into a scowl.

"I hope you like Scheherazade," Joker said as he stood up. “Korsakov’s orchestration can get a little oriental for some taste.”

Bruce was momentarily confused by the Joker’s sudden verbosity and the nature of his non-sequiter, until the music struck up its lilting, graceful strings. It was an alluring tune, whimsical and assertively sensual: its notes weaving lightly through the room for all its flamboyant touches.

He watched the Joker move across the marble-checkered floor with a feline grace, his scarlet skirt cascading and reforming around him in delicate ripples. It was an image both riveting and disturbing.

“One dance,” he relented, tossing his napkin and standing up to follow the man. Somebody had dimmed the light- and Bruce had to admit that, even borrowed, the Joker had his dogs very well trained.

The cell phone remained on the table where his  _date_  had negligently left it, tempting Bruce. With one last disgusted look, he walked away to join the Joker at the very centre of the dance floor, where the vaulted domes soared into a pinnacle wreathed with painted cherubs, and mammoth cathedral windows threw their variegated tints across the marble floor.

In this streaming cantata of candle and moonlight he took the Joker’s hand, watching him his lick torn lips as though his tongue was a foreign object that had crawled into his mouth and was busy dying. 

And for the first time in his life, Bruce literally and figuratively allowed another person to lead him around a dance floor, where none of the rules were familiar, where none of the rules were even his.

It should have been more distasteful, certainly more sordid. But it wasn’t.

It took more effort than he’d ever anticipated, trying to pretend that he wasn’t utterly at sea without the protective cloak of Batman’s rage and violent adrenaline, that it wasn’t weird and wonderful and strange and surreal seeing something so glittering, so-  _rare_ \- being performed in front of him,  _for_ him, something he doubts anybody else would ever see.

They waltz.

The Joker knew how to waltz.

It was there and then that Bruce begun to fathom the depths of his troubles.

*

“You know,” the Joker whispered against his chest, “I was really only planning to meet Batman for fun and games tonight. Although this  _was_  fun. Different, but fun.”

Bruce didn’t answer. Considering the surrealism of the scene, the fact that he found himself holding another man in his arms was of small consequence. His mind was busy calculating his options, fighting against the impulse to relax his guard and lean into the dizzying night.

 “Um. The nets inside this thing- they itch.”

 _“Good.”_

It was an uncharitable, even childish thing to say, but he didn’t see why  _he_  should be the only one who was uncomfortable.

“Frankly, I’d have preferred a shorter skirt,“ the Joker carried on, “you know, for the drafts. I have the cutest little nurse’s uniform, but then we really should be more demure...” he sighed, the sound surprisingly heartfelt as it vibrated against Bruce’s chest,“...classy, in a place like this.”

The low lights played over the sharp cut of the Joker’s shoulder blades; glittering, distracting. Bruce found himself leaning forward. 

“How old are you, really?”

“You don’t expect me to  _act_ my age, but you expect me to reveal it? Oh,  _Bruce_.”

He agreed it was a stupid question, inane, even unreasonable, but where he had never been curious about the Joker’s past, now he found himself wanting to know every possible morsel of information that could possibly be used against him.

This cycle of constantly underestimating the Joker- it had to end.

The music came to its final crescendo, and Bruce felt the weight on his jacket shift imperceptibly. For some reason, it disturbed him more than anything else that had happened so far that night, and without thinking, he shifted his own head, resting it against the green curls.

They stopped moving as the song came to an end, and although Bruce had no way to seeing, he somehow knew that the Joker had squeezed his eyes shut as the final notes bloomed, and then dissolved into the darkness.

Then silence.

And then the cold, unfeeling flood of lights.

Touched by a stange muddle of pity and tenderness, and perhaps something more unnameable, Bruce laid a hand on the riotous green curls.

There was no sign he could make, no words to say, nor any action that he could do to put this right. Whatever  _this_ was. And the truly difficult part was in knowing that the Joker knew it too.

“Well. Time to turn into a gourd,” the Joker said briskly as he broke away, eyes darting all around. “Now, are you going to let me leave with my dignity intact, or do we have to wrestle on the floor again? Not that I’m averse to being on the floor with you, but we do have an  _audience.”_  


“The cellphone?” Bruce asked hoarsely. He found himself irritated by the Joker’s effortless string of words when he could barely speak past the lump in his throat.

“Well, that’s really  _nice_ , not even going to ask if I’m going to get home  _safe_. All you care about is the stupid  _phone,_ ” The Joker picked up his skirts, something approaching rage glittering in his eyes, and turned away, leaving Bruce feeling, of all things, like he had just stepped on a kitten.

“Joker-”             

“ _Don’t bother to_ see me out!” the Joker’s voice was almost a scream as he stalked out of the restaurant, his retinue of masked bodyguards filling in obediently behind him. The doors slammed behind them.

Again, the silence- except this time the air was heavy with trapped memories.

And when the police burst in they found Bruce still standing in the middle of the dance floor; stunned, melancholic, and weighed down with misgivings.  

*

  
 


	15. Silent lake

15  
  
  
Officially, Gotham city has two cemeteries. 

  
The City Crypts is a cement and marble forest where the upstanding citizens of Gotham are interred; late mayors, judges, high officials, influential writers and charismatic preachers- all the movers and shaker of the day.

Harvey Dent is buried here: a massive marble tomb for Gotham’s white knight. The scales of justice, wrought in bronze, tops his headstone. One of the sides holds a permanent supply of white chrysanthemums; its twin contains a double-headed coin, shinny side up.

Bruce never visits this cemetery, although he knows that Jim Gordon frequently does. It is the place where his parents would have been buried, had it had existed during that time. Bruce gives thanks that it had not.

Gotham Cemetery, in marked contrast, is eerie, decrepit, and fenced in by miles of narrow, rusted rails that reached out of the earth like skeletal fingers. Sewer tunnels snake amongst ill-maintained graves, where the rats and the riffraff vagabonds make their home.  Stories of haunting abound.

On record, Rachel is buried in Gotham Cemetery, but not in a part of the cemetery that many know exist.

Northwest of the Wayne Memorial Clock Tower, there is a gated, grassy knoll overgrown with fragrant jasmine bushes and hidden by a vast lake of swampy reeds. Its only distinct feature is its simplicity, and the fact that in this small, unassuming plot of land, the long forgotten graves of Gotham’s founders and Bruce’s own ancestors lie here, along with his parents’.

Outside of the Palisades, it was the only truly peaceful place in Gotham.

Bruce always carries enough chrysanthemums for three graves, but he carries one red and white tulip, which he always lays vertically on Rachel’s headstone, followed by a finger to his lips which he brushes wistfully against her picture.

Those who knew her story had wanted to place her beside Gotham’s white knight, but the motion was a weak one, since Rachel had never placed herself in any capacity to be publicly remembered. Thus City officials had sniffed and remarked that she hadn’t been important enough to warrant a resting place at the Crypts.

It was to his shame that Bruce had never fought for this burial privilege on her behalf. Instead, he had watched from the shadows, and waited for it to die a silent death, permanently separating the resting place of two people who paid such a terrible price for their love.

And although his conscious had railed at him and Alfred had looked at him with wounded eyes, it was not something he could find in his heart to regret. Harvey had taken her away while she was alive and he had allowed it; in her death, he found himself unable to acquiesce to the same.

So he had hidden her here, where he hides his mementoes and memories of everything else- the shattered remains of a childhood made abruptly short, an ancient arrowhead, the gun which would have taken his soul, along with a murderer’s life. A half-burnt letter that he wished he had never found.

He brings his secret thoughts and memories here, to lay to rest.

Rachel smiles up at him, her eyes emphatic even in death as he tries to tell her about the Jok- about last night...

And the breeze blowing through the susurrus reeds consoles him when the words don’t come out.

*

  
 


	16. Cul-de-sac

 

16

  
Jim Gordon didn’t look good these days, despite the recent lull in crimes. In fact, he looked to Batman like a wet ashtray about to give out from one too many butt burns, hacking away fitfully as he stood under a pool of light from the street lamp on 27th and Sway, with the rain drizzling steadily down.

Almost losing his family only to lose his family had aged him, made him look breakable. The shadow of Ramirez’s betrayal probably haunted him, considering the number of times Gordon had been heard to publicly declare his trust for his unit as a whole, and Ramirez in particular. Since taking up promotion Gordon had been purging Internal Affairs with a obsessiveness that bordered on neurotic; a burning complusion that could only have been brought on by debilitating guilt.

It was common knowledge that Gordon never went home anymore, although whether it was the empty, phantom presence of his wife and children who haunted him, or Harvey Dent’s ghost, Batman had no way of knowing.

The sound of barking alerted them to the presence of guard dogs. Shielded by the subterranean dimness, Falcone’s bass voice echoed through the alley walls, blissfully unaware of Batman’s watchful presence on the second floor fire escape.

“So! This is good start. Cops and robbers, working together.”

“You might be a little lower on the scum list these days, Falcone, but you’re there.”

“Hah! So what you give us in return for the clown?

“You’re not helping us, we’re helping you. The Joker’s been on  _our_  side lately.”

“That clown on  _nobody’s_  side but Satan’s!” Falcone thundered. “You bring my nephew’s hospital documents?

Gordon threw the envelope at the mobster’s feet. “Sorry. I’m all  _thumbs”._  


The mobster’s beady black eyes glittered at the dig, but he gestured for one of his cronies to retrieve it.

The commissioner threw his cigarette butt into a puddle, where it hissed. “You gonna tell me what I wanna know?”

“Your freak is planning to show up at the fancy show. Miss Gotham. He wants to win the crown. Impress his Prince  _Wayne_. You let him in, you catch him there. Freak with a crown!”

“He’s planning to join the beauty  _pageant_?” Gordan echoed, sounding confused.

“You want to phantom mind of freak? Be my guest!” Falcone let out a bark of laughter, sounding a lot like one of his dogs. “Here’s thing.  _You_  rather be stuck with us.  _We_  rather be stuck with you. Circus can leave town.“

“Finally got tired of the act, did you?” The commissioner said scathingly as he broke into a cough.

‘Go home, Gordan,” Falcone said critically.”My mother makes good medicine. I send tomorrow.”

The dogs and footsteps retreated into the sound of squealing tires.

“Well?” Gordon asked as he peered blindly up at the awnings. He startled into an oath when the vigilante dropped down directly behind him. “Don’t do that!”

“Hardly trustworthy,” Batman rasped.

A silver lighter glinted in the streetlight as another cigarette found its way to the commissioner’s mouth. “Yeah well, we’re a little low on sources where the clown is concerned. He ain’t really the type to leave a person alive long enough to tell on him.”

“You think he’ll show.”

“Where else is he going to get another chance to enact his sick homosexual fantasies in front of every major news channel in the _planet_? It’s Miss Gotham  _Universe_. It’s a fucking farce,” Gordon bit out, “And worse, the cameras are going to love him, which means the rest of Gotham will too.”

“The Joker’s always had talent for making this city want what he wanted.”

A new fit of hacking assailed the commissioner. He broke off when he caught Batman’s steady gaze and bit out irritably: “I’m growing old. Haven’t you seen a man grow old before?”

“I’ve seen the signs of lung cancer before.”

Gordon ignored him in favour of courting cancer. “The pageantry’s in five days. More than enough time to create a cul-de-sac. Not enough time to make it fool-proof.”

“What about the innocent?”

“We’ll take whatever precautions we can. Maybe use Bruce Wayne to distract the clo-”

“The rest you’ll leave to  _hope?_ ”

“And you.”

“No.” Batman stalked away with a snarl. “It’s too open. Too many civilians in exchange for one chance.”

Gordon caught up with him. “ _Chances_  are, he already knows.  _Chances_  are, Falcone went from here straight to the Joker, like a dog to his master.  _Chances_  are, we won’t be able to keep an operation of this scale under wraps for long.” The commissioner broke off, rubbing at his forehead tiredly. “These are chances we’d have to take. Do the best with what we have.”

Batman turned to face Gordon abruptly, an impassive, taciturn facade carved of cold dark marble. His heavy gaze bore deeply into the commissioner’s widening eyes, examining every nuance of intention behind it.

Awkwardly, Gordon’s gaze slid away.

“I’d go it with you or I’d go at it alone. Odds are better if you’re around.” His tone crept up defensively as Batman remained silent. “Every day he’s out the possibilities of another Harv- another catastrophe increases. I  _can’t afford_  to let it happen again. I _can’t_  not try.”

The night drizzled on at length before Batman finally spoke. “And when you finally get the Joker, what do you intend to do with him?”

“ _Do_  with him?” Gordan shoved his hands into his pockets and begun to walk away. “You can keep your hands and clean as you like, Batman. But I plan on shooting to kill.”

*


	17. No humour in heaven

 

17 

Alone in the rain, an insane impulse moved Batman into removing his helm. The desire to free his face from the claustrophobic constraints of the Kevlar had been overwhelming that night; a restless and jittery heartbeat clawed at his chest, thrummed erratically in his ears.   


  
Bruce began to breathe again as the rain soaked through his hair in a gentle baptism. Rainwater dripped down the sides of his face, flecking his eyelashes, breaking the view of Gotham into a hundred silver shards.

Inhaling deeply, he tried in vain to summon some semblance of clarity to clear his head.

It was a testament to his weakness, how much the mention of the Joker’s name bothered him. One insignificant twirl around the dance floor, Bruce thought depreciatingly- and the Joker had him disarmed. He had suspended all the rules and pulled Bruce into a kingdom of terror and magic, awful in its beauty and darkly whispered promises. A nightmare; within which lies the alluring whispers of escape. 

And oh, how unwelcomed the realisation that he had been tempted; was still tempted, by these deceptive lures. 

Bruce was coming to comprehend that up close, without Batman’s automaton rage to hide behind, the Joker became terrifying not because he was homicidal horror, but because then Bruce came face to face with who he really  _was_. And there were brilliance there in equal measures to the madness; charm, charisma, most of all, sheer overwhelming presence. He radiated easy confidence, a body language that was breathtakingly at ease with its own self: his mind and body were one, in the artless, unstudied style of a wild animal; instincts as finely honed as the switchblades he wielded.

Here was a man who could have done anything, been anything. Yet here was a man who would rather blaze a trail straight to Hell, taking as many as he could along for the ride. For sport. For sheer fun and games. Simply because he could. Perhaps even as a perverse form of public service. Because he thought there was no humour to be had in heaven, and would rather end up in hell. Whatever impetus dwelled within that unholy, capricious mind, Bruce doubted he would ever discover.

He could not comprehend such a man, the immense waste of potential. Why did such anomalies exist, when there were men like Gordon, good honest hardworking men, men with less talent but more spirit?

_I’m growing old. Haven’t you seen a man grow old before?_

The words gnawed at him: Bruce could almost say no. No he hadn’t. Alfred had been old forever, the way a wizard was old and unchanging as an oak.

Even if Gordon was no father figure, he was still something significant, to both Bruce and Batman. A friend at the very least, a battle companion, somebody he trusted. A symbol of hope; proof that some people were simply  _good._  


Bruce ached for Gordon’s pain, and the way his mercurial emergence as commissioner must have seemed like such a false achievement when all family life had been torn apart. When he had come so close to witnessing his son’s life being taken by a man he trusted, the same man that Gordon believed he betrayed first, however unintentionally.

The Joker had seen to it that everything Gordon believed in had proven false, that his choices had been flawed, and that good people had paid for those choices with their lives.

It all boiled down to the Joker. The way he played them all like a deck of cards, handing out their fates with calculated glee.

He had to find the clown. Tonight.                                                               

*


	18. The truth is

 

18

 

He climbed through the same hole in the wall that the robbers had blasted through to get in, disarmed several clowns, and walked freely into the vault where the Joker was busy sweeping jewellery into an old paint bucket. Yards of diamond necklaces glittered in his hair, wound around his wrist and neck.

“Batsy!” Joker sounded surprised and even a little pleased to see him, although his eyes were busy darting around, undoubtedly considering escape options should the need arise.

“Lets go.”            

“ _Go_?” Intrigued eyes blinked up at him from tar smeared sockets.

 _“NOW,”_ Batman growled, his tone broking no argument as he turned away, cloak flying.

“Uh-uh. Very in-terest-ting.” The Joker dropped his bucket and hurriedly tamed his hair with spit. “Well boys, enjoy yourselves.  Oh, and  _do_  leave a little something for the night watch.“

With that parting quip, he hurried out after the dark knight, leaving a circle of clowns looking bewilderedly after their rapidly retreating backs.

“A midnight stroll is all good,” the Joker panted as he tried to keep up with Batman’s massive strides, “but chance’d be a lot more romantic if we slowed down.”

Batman stopped walking and abruptly, violently shoved the Joker against an alleyway wall. “That cell phone wasn’t rigged to blow.”

“Oh course not! I said in-nocent people, Batsy. Do you actually  _know_  of any in Gotham?”

Rather than release him, the Kelvar fist tightened and Batman shook the clown till his teeth rattled.

“You  _little-_ “

“A thank you note would have sufficed.” Joker wheezed, trying to recover.

 “ _What was the bloody point_?”

“Uh. Put.  _Down_.”

Batman released him with a snarl. “Talk!”

“Look, Batsy. I’ll make it really simple for you,” the clown drawled as he readjusted his vest. “Every night you go out and do the things you do, why? Because you  _loooove_  this city. Well, so do I. No, don’t growl yet, I just show it differently. And now Gotham wants us to get together. Don’t you want to give them what they want?”

“I want you to stop this insanity, before more people gets hurt!”

Joker sighed. “You know what your burden is? It’s not chaos or corruption or things that go bump in the night. No! Your burden, is purrr- _fection_. This  _need_ for all your pencils to line up just  _so_ , and it never ever does, does it? There’s  _all-_ ways going to be _some_ thing to wipe the smile off that pretty face,” He ended his sentence staring with discomforting scrutiny at the masked face, as if he could see right through it, observe truths that Batman himself would never be able to see about himself.   
  
There was an odd sort of honesty in that gaze— but the moment quickly broke, and the Joker resumed in lazy, playful voice as he poked the Kelvar chest; “The truth is, you’re a maniac depressive. Just look at your  _clothes, euch._  You neeeed someone. Like me, to help you see the lighter side of th-ughmm- ouch that smarts!”   
  
The red, ridiculously painted mouth form an ‘oh’ of pain as Batman wrapped a gauntleted fist over the gloved finger on his chest and twisted with an economical flick of wrist. The Joker sank slowly onto the rain-soaked pavement, his legs folding under him.   
  
“I think you broke my finger.” Joker grunted as he examined his hand critically. “Badddd, Batsy. Bad bat.”

“And I’ll break them one by one until-”

“Ah Hahahahahahah! Threats from the Batman! Wait, wait, lemme get up.” He waved his good hand in the air, gesturing for Batman to pull him up.

 “You  _really_  want to up the ante, Bats?” The Joker’s voice was cool as he straightened again and readjusted his tie. “So be it.”

Before he knew it there were two switchblades embedded in his Kevlar chest.

*


	19. Incubus

 

19

  
Stunned, Batman doubled over, only to crack his nose against the Joker’s sudden head butt. Pain exploded behind his eyes, eclipsing the growing throb in his chest as he toppled onto the wet pavement.

A vicious kick landed on his ribs, then another, before a well- placed nudge forced Batman on his back.

“Bruce, Bruce, Bruce Bruce Bruce.  _Why_  so serious?”

He had been  _a fool._  As big a fool as the rest of Gotham, forgetting who he was dealing with-

Batman gasped and choked when his chest was suddenly crushed beneath the Joker’s weight, frantically fighting the drowning sensation as blood trickled down his mouth and nose. 

Grunting, the Joker yanked off his mask. “Here, stop struggling. You’ll drown in that.”

Then he licked at the bloodied nose and Batman immediately snarled, twisting against the Joker’s nimble hands. Something was being twisted securely around his wrist, binding him- something with teeth-

Barbwire.

Batman struggled briefly, the barbs stinging but doing little damage against his armoured wrist. How the clown had managed to incapacitate him up in such a short time eluded him, although it figures that if anybody would be carrying bits of barbed wires in his pocket, it would be the Joker.

He essayed to speak, but each time his captor would simply hush or ignore him. Having gotten down on all fours like a cat, the Joker proceeded to spend long moments fastidiously licking away the blood that flowed from what was almost certainly a broken nose, making little purring sounds all the way.

Finally Bruce relented and ceased his struggles, accepting their futility. The Joker would have his sordid little way with him, no matter what. He could feel the blood from his chest soaking through the protective padding inside his armour. The loss of blood was making him lightheaded, his senses becoming unreliable; and although the pavement was solid, it felt like he was slowly sinking into it.

Bruce looked away, resisting the impulse to cough in discomfort. His neck was stiff from rigidly holding himself as far away from the Joker as possible, not that it worked. He could feel that snakelike-tongue slithering into every crevice.

He wondered why the little  _shit_ didn’t just  _stick_  it into his mouth and be done with.

“You know... what I think... we are?” Joker commented in between long, lapping licks; “I think... we are... each other’s... incubus.”          

Batman swallowed blood, his tongue thick. “No, you’re just a shit who won’t go away.”

I can see it now,” Joker shaped his hands into a screen and squinted at his captive. “Prince charming and the king of clowns. Beauty-” He leaned over,  stroking his sweat drenched hair. “-and the bat.”

“What the  _fuck_  do you want?”       

Joker burst into giggles at the swear word, which he quickly hid behind gloved fingers. 

 “Oh, oh, I think you know.  _I know_  you know.”

His head falling heavily against the pavement, Batman groaned and bit out: “You fucking  _pervert_. There’s no reasoning in the world that’s going to prevail with you, is there? You have to make everything as difficult as sh-” 

A loud smack of lips, as if his victim’s words were music to his ears. “Why be difficult, when with a little bit of extra effort, we can be impossible?”

Batman focused on shallow breathing, terrified that he would soon lose consciousness and be helpless to the Joker’s malicious affection. “Go to hell.”

“Hell is other people, they say. All that irritating extra cast...” the Joker moved against him briefly, and a gunshot resounded through the night, followed by scattered footsteps and screams. “I think we should move someplace more private, my dear. Where’s that gorgeous tank of yours?”

Disfigured lips descended, surprisingly soft against the swimming sensations in Bruce’s head just as his consciousness slipped away. “I’d always wanted for us to go for a ride together.”

  
 


	20. Grhhr

 

20

 

The first thing Batman became cognizant of were the small sounds of clicks and whirls. Someone was humming a tune, and the warm air was stifling, making him feel like he had just woken up in a coffin.

“Oh. Those.  _Toys_ , of yours. Who’s your Santa, sweetheart? Because I like him. I’d like to  _pr_ y him open and  _see_  what’s in those big fat brains of his. Mmmmm.”

Forcing his eyes to open into unwilling slits, he saw the Joker lick his lips as his eyes rolled to the back of his head, clearly ecstatic at whatever gruesome visuals was running through his twisted mind.

“Oh. Check this out, check this out.” A white gloved hand pressed several random buttons, watching rocket launchers and machinegun bullets scatter into random objects while he clapped. “Oh ahhhh, such state of the art  _smarts_  you surround yourself with, Batsy. Batsy? Are you with me?”

A slap shook Bruce out of his stupor. “Nggggh.”

“I wouldn’t move much, if I was you.” The Joker’s voice vibrated weirdly, intimately close, until Bruce realised that they were in his Batmobile. Somehow, he’d fainted dead away and the little shit had succeeded in uncovering his car’s hiding place and hauled him there.   
  
Batman wanted to break away, to curse, but the only thing that escaped was a groan.   
  
The animated blur of white that was the Joker came closer. “Uh-uh. Batsy?”

Bruce couldn’t feel anything, other than heat and drowsiness and a pressing need for his eyes to roll shut again. “Fuckoff” he mumbled, “Grhhr.”

“Grhh? Grhhh! Arrrrrr! Oh, thats good, Batsy, you’ve even beginning to sound like me.” The Joker patted his lap affectionately. “They do-do say that couples will pick up each other’s traits, but I never believed it till now.”

He watched Batman’s head slump further down with narrowed eyes and wriggled even closer. “See, we both know you’re not the brains behind that  _fetching_  outfit, Batsy. You and me are both the same kind of animal. We’re both dogs, all we  _need_  is a good bone to bite. Or a good boner- oooo did i just make a naughty joke? Hehhhhheheheheheh- omphhhh” he staggered back from the fist that the dark knight suddenly shoved into his face, sending speckles of blood flying.

Batman flexed his throbbing knuckles with a growl. “We’re nothing alike!”

“I should have strapped you in first,” Joker muttered, wiping the blood behind soiled gloves. “Taking out the wires was a baaad idea.”

“I’m going, to...” Again, the roar of ocean in his ears. ‘To-”

“To? Yes Bats?” In the darkness of the car, the Joker’s green eyes gleamed like a cat.

Batman blinked. He couldn’t for the life of him remember what he was about to say. A warm wave pulled him under, and he went.

“Hell- _lo_?”

Silence.

Out of the corner of his eye, the Joker observed that there was really quite a bit of blood glistening at him from the leather seats.

Another slap, but the Kevlar-encased body remained motionless.

“Mmm. Tick _tock_ tick _tock_ tick _tock_ …” Joker hummed to himself, trailed off, becoming bored. “Ok.”

He dialled a number on his cell phone and cleared his throat “Uh, Alfie? Better call an ambulance…”

*


	21. Made in China

 

21  
  
  


Bruce was jerked awake by a terrible crash, followed by the excruciating pain of being pitched violently forward.  

“Opps,” an irritable voice tickled his ear. “ _There’s_  the dammed breaks. Now. How do we get these seatbelts off?” The voice tapers off to more muttering. “-everything’s so  _hidden_  in this car, didcha fly the little batcar engineers down from Japan?”

The monologue went on at lenght before the car doors finally flew opened. The voice left the vehicle; Bruce had no way of knowing for how long, and then returned, yelling at somebody a distance away.

“I already _said_  I was sorry! There’s no- I couldn’t find the manual!” The voice dropped to an apologetic whisper, and Bruce felt a hand carding through his sweat-drenched hair. “I couldn’t find the air-con, either.”

Joker. God help him, Bruce recognised the voice now. The lights spilled over the front porch and he made out Alfred’s shape approaching, gesturing and speaking in low, soothing tones.

“Well you must be the royal butter. The loyal butler.  _Dee_ lighted to swap household tips. What do you use to get those grizzly blood stains to come off? He always smells so  _good_.”

“I boil the batsuit in vinegar,” he heard Alfred replied gamely.                 

“Well. As I was saying, we were playing, and he kinda-” the Joker tried to roll his head up, unsuccessfully. “-broke.”

“Master Bruce is- a lot more fragile than he sometimes pretends to be.” There was a quiet censor in Alfred’s dignified tone.

“Uh-uh...” the Joker had his hands in his pockets, scuffing at his shoes like a schoolboy in trouble. “Couldn’t find the batmask after it…. fell off.”

Alfred deliberately ignored the blood and lipstick marks all over the comatose man‘s face and continued to speak in the same, soothing tone. “That’s all right. That’s all right. Plenty more where that came from.” A conspirators whisper, followed by a wink. “They’re made in  _China_.”

The Joker actually blinked, perhaps registering true surprise for the first time since he became the Joker.

“Oh.”                                                     

“Give him to me, Joker, and I’ll make sure your playmate’s right as rain in no time.”

“You’ll fix him.”                                       

“I promise.”

An equal silence was shared by the two men standing outside Wayne manor while its owner laid helpless between them. It was a heavy stillness, one that communicated less than a promise, but more than the sum of their spoke words.   
  
The shared look beween them culminating in the shallowest of nods from the Joker, and an almost indiscernible easing of the butler's shoulders. All the same, a few more seconds passed before the Joker managed to step away, giving Alfred a clear path to his injured charge.  
  


Bruce was numb and groggy there were heavy spots of darkness under his eyelids, but he was still surprised to hear Alfred consult with the Joker on the best way to move him.   
  
He had the sensation of being lifted by strong arms, and being carried. The cool night air hit him, and he shuddered, making a sound of relief.

Then the Joker was rapidly moving again, and it was all he could do not to lose consciousness once more.

His eyes were fluttering closed by the time they placed him in his bed. Alfred’s weight dipped beside him, and he felt the many latches of his Kevlar armour being removed.

Despite the pain and his barely conscious state, somehow the thought that his butler shouldn’t be undressing him in front of the Joker still made its way into his head. And before Bruce could register how surprisingly inane the thoughts one could have when mortally wounded, he passed out.

*


	22. Gift du jour

 

 

22

 

 

One week spent in forced confinement waiting for his wounds to heal had Bruce climbing the walls; and by the time the Joker’s get-well presents arrived, almost breaking through them.

 

On the first day he was actually able to leave his bed an elaborate white cage arrived containing two tremendous bats, trussed up and hung like chickens in purple strings. 

 

The card read:

**_Did you know that in relation to size, the tube lipped bat is the mammal with the longest tongue?_ **

Three days later, Alfred found a pair of giraffes wondering in the manor gardens, placidly chewing their way through the trellis-grown roses. One of them had black paper mache ears stuck to the sides of its head; the other wore a green wig.

 

Bruce didn’t get to keep the giraffes, but he  _did_  get to read the card:

**_Did you know that these babies can clean their own ears (and each others) with their tongue?_ **

                            

At the end of the week, Alfred told Bruce in a very firm voice that he was  _not_ going to remove the whale tongue sitting on the porch. And since the lord of the manor had such predilections for running around with amorous, over-generous green haired clowns he could bloody well do it himself, and mop up the blood while he’s at it.

 

Alfred was seldom snappish, which meant that Bruce found himself at the front door with a garbage bag and a mop in record time. He didn’t bother to read the blood soaked card sticking out of it like a butcher’s blade.

 

He vaguely hoped that it didn’t come from the Gotham aquarium. He fervently hoped the whale was dead before the Joker had cut its tongue out.

                                                           

The gifts however, didn’t trouble Bruce as much as his own indiscriminating memories.  Such as the fact that considering the violence of his last altercation with the Joker, the instances that stood out most vividly in his mind were its… less aggressive aspects: the way it felt to have his arch-nemesis’ exaggerated whispers tickling his ears; the giddy sensation of being carried, the almost  _profound_  yearning for comfort and shelter that came out of nowhere, as if when he broke their physical barriers the Joker had found a long festering nerve and pressed it. He had never felt sheltered, not since he was-

 

Not since he had been a child.

 

The weight and vividness of a flickering tongue came back to him, reminding Bruce of twenty four tiny bat hearts, brutal and skillfully removed. And that was the heart of the Joker, really. Brutal, skillful, lacking a heart. Except that now, Bruce truly feared that the Joker’s gambit was beginning to pay off, that he was beguiling Bruce Wayne to disarm Batman, and that was truly something to worry about. Yet perversely, it was intriguing, the fact that the Joker had no boundaries was unbreakable, would hold no notions of dirt or ugliness, experienced no awkward moments. He would not respond to formulaic love, nor appreciate perfection. The Joker would have no expectations, truly lived in the moment, running around laughing, catching fireflies and falling stars, as if he was a child.

 

Bruce always shivered when these thoughts crept up to him, making his feel as young and uncertain as a child.

 

Shelter and stars, tongues and laughter and chocolate sauce. Really bad music.

 

Really good music. With curiosity, and cruelty, and knives.

 

What would it be like, to have nobody and nothing to live up to?

 

There were days when Bruce wondered if madness was contagious.

 

*

  
 

 


	23. Bahamas

23

 

The first time Bruce had caught himself experimentally flicking his tongue at the corners of his mouth, licking his lips and dancing over his teeth, he assured himself that it proved  _nothing._

                                                    

The first time  _Alfred_  caught him, Bruce discovered that he still had the capacity to blush. 

 

“Its just morbid curiosity, Alfred.”

 

“I guess there’s no accounting for the sort of things that ignites ones sense of curiosity.”

 

Bruce had struggled not to sigh in relief. “That’s what I like to think.”

 

“Although I must say-“

 

“I’d really rather you  _didn’t_.“

 

“-there’s no accounting for one’s subconscious taste,” his butler remarked dryly as he walked away. “Personally, I think you’d have done better by the Scarecrow. At least that one used to be a doctor.”

 

If Alfred hadn’t taken all the dinner dishes away, Bruce believed he might have broken a few over the shutting doors.

 

*

 

The following week saw Bruce so desperate to get away from the Joker’s invisible presence and Alfred’s relentless quips that he found himself accompanying his ex on one of her protracted, self indulgent shopping trips.

 

She had always been good at picking suits however, which meant that he’d at least manage to keep up appearances as a fashion fop for another six months, which was reasonably redeeming; which was to say that things were as good as things were going on the altar ego front. 

 

Getting himself taped and measured for the umpteenth time, however, never failed to make Bruce jittery and terse so that by the time his cell phone rang, his greeting was almost a bark.

 

“Weeell. Somebody’s tense and in dire need of a massage.”

 

“Or a vermin exterminator,” Bruce replied with a sigh. He really didn’t care to analyze his own resignation or lack of surprise to the nasal, sing-song voice on the other side of the phone, although he did feel a little belligerent.

 

“Is that any way to greet a friend who’s just dying to find out if his playmate’s going to live through their last little sandbox encounter?”

 

“I’d rather you just died,” Bruce replied shortly. Sandbox encounter indeed. It was however, damnably difficult to keep his voice stern when his lips were beginning to quirk.

 

 The Joker actually purred into the phone. “Mmmmmm. And then where would you be without me?”

 

“The Bahamas.”

 

A long, speculative silence followed this revelation, stretching till Bruce, face flaming, hissed into the phone; “What the fuck do you want?”

 

“I just wanna talk,” The Joker’s voice was all sing-song innocence. “Which would you rather me do; call you for a chat when I’m bored? Or go downstairs to my dreary little basement and put together a couple of bombs?”

 

Silence.

 

“Tick _toc_ ktick _tock_ tick _tock_ -“

 

“All right I’ll play your stupid game!”

 

“That’s better. You need to relax a little, all work and no play makes Batman a dull flying rodent.”

 

“When you’re not down in that dreary little basement, do you spend your time coming up with inane little gems like that?”

 

“I haven’t been downstairs in some time. You must be a positive influence, Batsy darling. Maybe you could persuade me to retire.” The joker taunted. “What are you looking at?”

 

“What?”

 

“You really need to work on the art of conversation. I asked you what you were looking at!”

 

Bruce scowled. “A fucking dress.”

 

“A dress that fucks? Oo buy me one!”

 

*


	24. Dress that-

24

 

Bruce idly wondered if the walls were changing colour, or if it was just his blood pressure breaking through his veins.

 

“Joker.”

 

“Yes?”

 

“No more quips, or this conversation is over.”

 

“Yes darling.” The voice was very meek. “Please, tell me about the dress.”

 

Bruce found his jaw working soundlessly as he contemplated the bizarre nature of his conversation. However, before a reply could formulate, his companion had called him away to give critique on her dress: Bruce found himself saying, “It looks better in red,” and then looking at the phone in his hand with horror. 

 

The scream of laugher from the hand phone was audible even without the aid of a hands-free.

 

“You’ve got a very happy friend on the line,” his companion smiled as she disappeared back into the changing room.

 

“He should be; his stocks have been singing like a canary,” Bruce replied glibly as he walked with a deliberately unhurried pace to a more remote corner. In to the phone he snarled “Shut up!”

 

“Oh. OH.  _I knew_  you liked the dress,”

 

Whether the laughter had changed, or he had changed, Bruce didn’t care. It was not hard imagining the tears of mirth smearing black tracks on the pasted face, and briefly, Bruce found himself wondering if he would ever be able to laugh like that. He found himself wanting to try. He felt an expansion within, unfamiliar and almost like panic, except better, and it wanted to come out in chortles-

 

“Bruce, could you come over and zip me up?”

 

There was a sudden, frigid silence from the phone. “Ah. Hold on,” Bruce said uncomfortably as he placed the phone on a display shelf before moving back to the changing rooms.

 

He told himself there was no way he could afford to risk another round of the Joker’s laughter spilling out for other ears.

He knew he was lying.   

 

His companion gave him a speculative look, which Bruce ignored. As he went back to the retrieve his phone, he found himself feeling unaccountably guilty for no good reason at all.

 

“She must be pretty.”

 

Blatant Jealousy in the Joker’s voice- why did he feel like smiling?

 

“Spare me the hissy fits. Your last one was not cute.”    

 

To his surprise, Bruce was actually obeyed, which made him instantly suspicious.

 

 “Yes sir, Mister Batsy sir. Is it a nice dress?”

 

“I suppose.”

 

“Is it a _… very nice dress?”_

 

Bruce knew he shouldn’t be participating in such inanities; encouraging their frivolous, flirtatious palavers. He shrugged. “Its adequate.”

 

“How do you think I’d look in that?”

 

Bruce found himself rooted to the spot as the Joker’s low, insinuating voice slithered over him like a warm, beckoning liquid. Now that he’d stopped rolling his syllabus and speaking in that exaggerated nasal voice, the sensation of listening to him speak through a phone pressed to his face was an oddly intimate one.

 

He’d give anything for the sudden dryness in his throat to go away as he rasped, “It’d go well with a straight jacket.”

 

“I bet I could fill it out much better than that mannequin. And  _you…_ ”

 

The joker’s voice was low, with an undertone of teasing that made him think of  _tongues._

 

“You…you’d get to  _take it off_.”

 

*


	25. I luv B.W.

25

 

Fucking clown.

 

The night had been an unnaturally warm and sultry one, the hours slipping by sluggishly. The rest that Bruce needed so badly eluded him as he tossed between too-thick sheets, stewing over the Joker’s latest fait accompli.

 

It had taken Gordon four hours and two thousand dollars to remove and replace the tower lights that had projected the Joker’s message all over Gotham city, including the one on top of GPD which had once served as the Bat signal. While cameras whirled and civilians laughed on the streets, the police had had to break into buildings on the opposite ends of town to disarm the fence of bombs and ‘keep out’ signs scrawled in red lipstick- all in order to remove the ‘I luv B.W’ scrawl that had been projecting extremely well into the night sky. All six of them.

 

Gordon had subjected Bruce to some rather blistering commentary about wasting his men’s time, but Bruce had an ugly suspicion that even he had found the whole exercise funny. His men certainly hadn’t hid the fact that they did.

 

Licking his lips as his mind wondered restlessly, Bruce reflected on his own reactions to being the recipient of such… unique affections. Was he not secretly flattered, no matter how wrong? The media certainly told him he should be. Everyone loved the giraffes, and the zoo, having received unprecedented traffic through its doors, had even renamed them after the city’s most talked about pair du jour.

 

Needless to say, Alfred had a field day with that piece of news.

 

Bruce shuddered into the sheets. Perversity had its appeals- he would be a liar and fraud if he wasn’t somewhat familiar with this baser aspect of human nature, wasn’t even somewhat appreciative of its uses- the whole concept of Batman was after all, a wholly deviant one when considered in the cold light of day.

 

He didn’t like it so much when fate was perverse, however. For here, alone in the dark, with no universal morality to judge and find him wanting, the Joker’s mad, insinuating charisma reigned victorious. Here, alone, his memories and fantasies fused; mutated, became indistinguishable, quickening the pace of his heart.

 

And there was always one particular fantasy, one phantasmagoric possibility, one memory in particular which made his body clench and unravel at the same time. A reminiscence of tongues, its weight and wetness a silky echo of the blood seeping from his chest from the Joker’s knife wounds. And under half-closed eyes, in a body warmed and velvety with sleep and a mind lulled by painkillers, Bruce allowed himself to imagine the kiss that did not happen.

 

Before the doors opened and Alfred drew the curtains away from these deviant, inappropriate, impossible fantasies, he could relive and imagine the sensation of those compelling, ugly-beautiful hands tracing invisible riddles into his skin.

 

Eyelids fluttering close, he exhaled into the sheets as his hands stroked lower, biting his lips to steady the quickening breaths and the tremors in his limbs. Beads of sweat broke out on his temple, turned his fingers clammy as his thumbs trace circles on his hipbones, moving low- and his body became racked with shudders as his feverish mind imagines a thick, wet tongue slithering into his mouth just as he touched himself, a vision which quickly proved too much.

 

He comes.

 

Abandoned in a tossing sea, Bruce allowed himself to relinquish his death grip on common sense, to sink into and ride out those sensual, unreal sensations.

 

 

And after the embers of his mad passion had cooled and the sound of discreet knocking accompanied the cold light of dawn, Bruce told himself that this onslaught of intensity had been brought on by stress. Agitation caused from prolonged and repetitive re-visualization. Wasn't there a name for it?

 

Gripping the sheets tightly around him, Bruce bleakly wondered what tattered defences were left availed to a man whose mind was so foolish as to turn against itself.

 

Perhaps this was what it felt like to go mad.

*


	26. Chocolatiere

 

26

 

The end of the week saw Bruce so desperate to get away from the Joker’s invisible but relentless presence that he was happy to accept all five date invitations that had came his way- at the same time.

                                                                              

His helicopter whisked them around the yacht docks and Gotham city’s various yuppie playgrounds, while a line of media and paparazzi cars followed them from the ground like a trail of black ants. To pass the time, Bruce encouraged his pilot to hover dangerously low to the road and instigated a game of trying to drench the moving targets with their champagne. He stuffed cash into the cleavage of whoever managed to hit a camera.

 

At least then he didn’t have to drink so much of the stuff.

                     

The day went well, and there were even moment where Bruce actually felt entertained and enjoyed himself, forgetting cameras and clowns. In the evening, as the air begun to cool, he had the pilot alight them at a scenic little street in the French Quarter which sold chic coffee and overpriced croissants to Gotham’s trendy Francophiles.

 

Camera’s trailing, they walked past street mimes, whimsical antique shops, and a chocolatiere- in front of which Bruce came to an abrupt and sudden halt.

 

There was a tree in the middle of the chocolatiere, completely decorated with chocolate baubles and strung up in tiny fariy lights. Bruce stared at the tree, his heart sinking as the very thoughts that he had succeeded in avoiding all day assailed him.

 

Unwelcomed thoughts of how delighted  _he_  would have been to see it.

 

Wondering why he hadn’t  _stolen_  it.

 

And because he was a masochist, Bruce went in and bought the tree, even though it had not been for sale. He had it shipped to Jim Gordon’s kids, and signed ‘GP Dept’ on the card.

 

One bauble he kept, because it had been dipped in green and pink sprinkles. In his pocket, of all places, where it promptly melted, and when Alfred retrieved it late that night it had become a twisted and misshapen thing, chocolate sauce bleeding all over the splotchy sprinkle remains of its shell.

 

“What were you thinking, removing a chocolate ball from a chocolate tree and stuffing it into your pocket?” Alfred muttered.

 

 Bruce shrugged easily as he ignored the heat creeping up the back of his neck. “I wasn’t sure if I was going to eat it, so I hung on to.”

 

“Well it’s gone.” Alfred said as he tossed it. “Belongs in the trash now, with your five thousand dollar suit.”

 

And for one brief heartbeat as he watched the now deformed ball hitting the bin, Bruce regretted sending the tree to the wrong address.  

 

*


	27. Monster & Maestro

 

27  
  


Moody and melancholic, Batman wandered the rooftops of the city he kept watch on. The sight of Gotham swallowed in miasma, slumbering like an innocent child, soothed him- however illusory the sight was. At night she was beautiful, bathed in shadows and the glitter of lights; statuesque, solitary and so elegant in repose.

His meet-up with Gordon had ended on a sour note tonight, marking a downward turn in their tenuous working relationship. Each had always believed implicitly in the other’s support, but Batman feared that the day was coming when this would no longer be the case. In many ways, as time passed and settled them into more established roles they had grown into mammoths beyond themselves; less the man, more the institution or idea. Batman wondered, with a sense of loss, if the time was coming when they would each want different things, in a situation which called for no compromises.

They’ve had disagreements before, but never an altercation of this magnitude. Like it or not, the commissioner of Gotham was going to throw everything he had at the Joker- swat, national security, FBI, every cop that GPD had to spare- they would all be mobilised for the Joker’s unsubstantiated appearance at Miss Gotham Universe.

He had never engaged in polemics as Batman before. The whole function of Batman was to use his fist, rather than his words. Nevertheless he had turned them on Gordon tonight, words; twenty years of private tutors and ivy-league education, and Gordon had not been prepared, was not expecting this verbal attack.

The look on the commissioner’s face as they had ended their conference still stung- it’s broken, betrayed quality haunted him. It was the face of a man coming apart at the seams, a man holding desperately on to himself so that he could accomplish one more thing- bring the Joker in, or kill him.

The thought of such a collision, the potential scale of damage it could wrought-

Far away, his ears picked up the wispy strains of a vaguely familiar, yet unidentifiable tune. Intrigued, Batman followed the whispering echoes of melody, drawn by an invisible presence pulling him forward.

The music almost seemed to move as he approached, simultaneously elusive and enticing. The further he followed the more haunting it became, each caress of the bow gracefully unfurling, coaxing its notes higher, the song beginning to soar louder, higher, until he found himself physically in a place he didn’t recognise and too spellbound to care.

This, Bruce thought, was what a true virtuoso’s violin playing was, nothing like the Joker’s bawdy abuse of the instrument. It was almost frightening, realising how badly he wanted to believe in the illusion of peace that it presented, a temporary reprieve from the troubles of angry commissioners, jeering press and phantasmagoria stalkers.

Enchanted, he continued to follow the music across a narrow ledge of roof and onto a small, untidy surface riddled with crumbling chimneys. The sweeping strings soared higher and higher still. Palpable echoes of melancholia filled the air, giving voice to all the long-buried sensations of his heart

 And then from nowhere, the music stopped- abruptly strangled.

His common sense returning, Batman ducked behind a chimney and stilled, heart hammering, suddenly aware of the contrived nature of the sudden silence filling the night. One hand dropped to his utility belt, resting on the weight of his gun...

He was suddenly shoved into the hard bricks, his assailant’s hands bracing against the still tender injuries on his chest. Pain bloomed as the Joker pressed closer into him, the expression on his face maniacally gleeful.

“Don’t you ever wanna know how I got these scars, Batsy? Hehe. We’ve been doing this for some time now, and its ru-de not introduce one’s back-story pro-per-ly-”

Panting from pain and the Joker’s crushing weight, Batman grabbed the gloved wrist that was holding on to an old, badly scarred Stradivarius. “I’d rather know where you learnt how to do that.”

Joker looked surprised and slightly disgruntled, as if Batman was changing something in their usual palavers. He frowned, but silently moved away, allowing the other man the chance to recover and breath.

“There are other ways to ask for an encore.”

“Why don’t you stop trying to be funny for once and give me a genuine answer?”

For a full minute, the Joker didn’t say anything, didn’t seem to have anything to say. Then finally-

 “Take off that mask.”

It seemed fair, a layer for a layer. A mask for a mask. The physical exhilaration of violence swapped for another dance of sorts; still physical but more waltz-like, still exhilarating, but in a wholly different level.

Batman hesitated. Bruce didn’t.       

He pulled the headpiece off, knowing that with this action, he was as good as acknowledging something was changing, had changed. For the first time since the Batman was born, an insatiable creature forged of fury and restless vengeance, the Dark Knight was taking a backseat to Bruce Wayne.

And Bruce Wayne found himself truly wanting to hear what this half monster, half maestro had to say.

*                                        


	28. Fiddler on the Roof

 

28  
  


Despite his relaxed posture, the Joker’s eyes on him were intent, watchful. His voice was calm, un-Jokerlike.

“There was a girl, you know. Beautiful, like your Rachel.”

Bruce tried in vain to summon the anguish that usually came so easily whenever her name was mentioned, but the emotions fizzled in the breeze, as if the plaintiff cries of the violin had truly hushed the sting of loss and loosened the death grip of guilt that had so long festered in his heart.

“Obviously, showing her  _this-”_  the clown gestured mockingly at himself, “-was out of the question.” His voice became the Joker again, darkly teasing, “uh-uh, you don’t forget the ru- _les_. Except that she d _id_ make me forget. For music, she said, she could see past anything. Anything.. but  _this_. I tell you, Batsy, learn this, if you haven’t already: women ain’t nothing but trebles.”

Bruce snorted at the bad pun. “You were a musician?”

The Joker looked mildly insulted. “I still am!”

“Who dresses up as a clown.”

A pause in the air, like a cleft, and Bruce asked wryly, “Isn’t there some unspoken rule somewhere that says musicians are supposed to take themselves seriously?”

“Oh  _yes_. Ca-no-ni-cal and Con-sci-en-tious,” The Joker smacked his painted lips, grinning widely. “Where dedication to your craft means looking dour, wearing black, and  _talfking wif plumfs inf yourf moufth._  Do you know what a virtuoso is?”

A sigh. “I  _know_  you’re about to tell me.”

“A musician with Very High Morals; I’m sure we all know one in our lives. And you know what music is? A complex organizations of sounds that is set down by somebody dead with a quill, incorrectly interpreted by somebody alive with a baton, who is then ignored by the musicians, the result of which is ignored by the audience.”

“Were you any good? At your- craft?” Even as he asked, Bruce wondered if their surreal conversation here on the rainy rooftops of Gotham would have constituted as flirting, something two people would do over dinner as they sized up each other’s potential. Granted the layers of palavers were more convoluted, and the stakes an unknown.. but it was also to disarm the Joker, he told himself. If he could get under the Joker’s skin as effectively as the Joker had gotten under his, he might have a chance of stopping Gordon’s plans from occurring.

The expression on the Joker’s face had turned inwards. “The devil is in the details. And I was  _very_  detailed. So, yes, Batsy. One might say one that. And you know the funny thing? In return for all our craft, all the reviews and encores and adulation, we still aren’t allowed to come in through the front doors. No.  _The way to the hall, sire, is through the garbage disposal doors, past the smoky kitchens, back stairs, freight elevator..._  but you have to suffer for your art. Everybody knows that.”

“So you turned to the art of murder instead? To share the suffering?”

“Or, to get your attention!” This time the Joker’s grin was rakish.

“And now you have it.” Bruce narrowed his eyes at him. “Except that’s not really what you want, is it? Nothing would ever be enough.”

“Ah Batsy, dear. You’ve yet to hear my masterpiece! Watch and listen. There’s music in my madness!”

“You’re not mad. “ Bruce said firmly. “Just taking the easy way out.”

“Oh-ahahaha! Not mad! Oh Batsy, I’m mad. I’m  _mad_.” And abruptly there was so much anger suddenly pouring out of the Joker that his voice vibrated like a harp about to break, even as it fell to a whisper, filling the air- thickening it with the faceless ghosts of long-held festers. They pulled at Bruce, made him feel the old aches within him respond; his own rages, so long without voice, silently asserting themselves. Years of hard won discipline enabled him to clamp down on this rise of empathy and commiseration, strangled them before they gave voice to his own inner darkness. He knew then how close it had been for him, how near he had been to drowning it in his sorrow the way the Joker had, all those years ago. 

But he also knew it was too late, the Joker was no longer a cut out cardboard monster. He had a voice, a face; there was a man behind the monster.

It only made the monster so much harder to bear.

*


	29. Peppermint chocolate & tongue

 

29  
  


“Why are you telling me all this?”

“Besides the fact that you asked?” The Joker’s smile turned teasing. “Maybe I just want somebody to seeeee me for who I am. Maybe I’m genuinely in lurvvve with you, Mister Bat, the way I constantly profess. And maybe it all part of the plaaan.”

“Maybe you just want to screw with my head.”

“Ohahahahaha. Frankly, my dear. I’d rather screw something else.”

The Joker extracted something large and riotously coloured out of his pocket, which he flourished in front of Batman’s face with a theatrical ‘ta-dah!’ Then he proceeded to crack it open. “I love these things. I love them. Here.”

The clown held up half a chocolate Easter egg, eyes blinking with mock innocence.

 And Bruce looked at the Joker and remembered the fake eyelashes and the red dress, the bloodied bat hearts and whale tongue, the chocolate bauble lying crushed in the bin after he had unthinkingly destroyed it.

“A bit late in the year,” Bruce sighed, but he took it. 

“That’s the one problem, you know, with this job,” Joker said in between loud, slurping licks and the sound of crinkling foil. “You only gotta go for the things you really like, because at the  _scale_  you end up stealing something, you’s be eating it forever. But- nobody’s job is perfect. And mine is already almost there. I mean, who else gets up every day to go to work with a big  _smile_  on his face?”

Batman almost says ‘its’ not a job’, except he knows how hypocritical it sounds, and so remained taciturn. He tore half-heartedly at the wrapper of the chocolate egg instead.

For awhile, a comfortable silence reigned, before the Joker suddenly broke into pointless giggles.

“I have a song!”

“I didn’t like the last one.” It was really typical of the Joker to have the shittiest timing in the world, Bruce thought irritably.

‘This one’s better.”

“Don’t want to hear it.”

The tune was predictably bawdy. “HERE’S— Joker and the Batman sit-ting in a tree-”

Somewhere out of the corner of his eye, he felt the Joker shift closer.

 “K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”  And then the Joker’s mouth is upon his.

Taken by surprise, Bruce opened his mouth. And bit.

The taste of the Joker was blood and peppermint chocolates and tongue. The Joker was not an aggressive kisser but an opportunistic one, his lips and tongue moving wet and sinuously as he traced the ridges of his teeth, brushing velvet weight against his tongue, dancing just shy of ‘too much’. The breathy sounds of satisfaction that he made whenever he got his way were -like everything about him- obscene and disarming.

Bruce broke it off when the eddies of lust became too much and he felt his sanity dangerously close to being swept away. The Joker was gazing at him through half-shuttered jade eyes, licking his lips like he was trying to decide whether billionaire bat or chocolate tasted better.

“Nmmmm,” he murmured to himself in that childish, nasally sing-song way of his. “Mmmmm.”

Bruce forced himself to return the gaze, even though the moment might already been too much. He hates the Joker’s mask, the ease of which it takes over the man behind it.

He hates his own mask, the face he knows he will choose over himself.

Suddenly, Bruce doesn’t see why he has to choose. He might have fashioned Batman to be the stronger character at the moment, but that didn’t mean Bruce Wayne was completely useless.

It had been  _Bruce Wayne_  who created Batman.

“Come with me,” he whispered, rubbing a thumb on the white paste along one jaw. “You don’t need to wear this mask.”

*

 


	30. Mad dog

 

30

A sudden stillness met his words, as if the Joker has frozen to stone beneath his hands.

Bruce knows he will never forget that moment, that absolute frozen silence from the hyper-animated Joker. It was an unnerving motionlessness, as if the man’s heart had stopped beating.

Then he felt a slight tremor beneath his fingers, and it  _frightened_  Bruce, the knowledge that  _he_  had made the Joker afraid. Frightened and thrilled and made him feel more invincible and more vulnerable at the same time. But the moment quickly broke, leaving him feeling like he had imagined it.

After a false start, the sing song quality in the Joker’s voice became more pronounced than ever. “But- but we’re  _dancin_ , Batsy. Don’t you li _ke_  to dance?”

“I want to change the nature of the- dance.”

The Joker’s face fell, although his Cheshire grin remained. He slipped nimbly out of Bruce’s grasp, and it seemed now that their tables were turned, and suddenly it was the Joker who seemed to be feeling sorry for Bruce.

 “I’m just a dog, ya know. Sometimes I’m a- I’m a  _cute_  dog. Mostly, I’m just a  _mad_  dog. But you! You’re not just a BAT. And you’re not just any bat. You’re my... bad. Yes, my bad. Look at you.”

There was a message there, perhaps a warning, some sort of regret in that mess of natter that did not come from the Joker, but the man inside him. Try as he did however, Bruce didn’t follow, couldn’t follow the Joker’s mad logic. 

Earnestly Bruce tried to persuade him. “I’m not talking about Arkham. Or Gotham. Or any place in particular, I’m talking about just leaving. I can open doors for us, doors you can’t imagine.”

But the Joker was humming as he moved away, a ditty consisting of ‘my bads’ and ‘look at yous’ and ‘o dear nonononos’ and Bruce couldn’t grasp the reason for the hysteria swelling in the Joker’s green-eyed gaze, the fact that he refused to meet his eyes. The musical cadence in that sing-song tone was flat; its inflections in all the wrong places. His words rung fake and flaking; hollowed, as if something was breaking.

Confused, bewildered, and a little alarmed- even as he knew that he was physically safe as he would ever be in the Joker’s presence, Bruce watched helplessly as the other man ramble around in zig-zaging circles as he chanted his unique brand of Joker gibberish.

“-yes yes, my bad my bad look at him, we can’t have that can we?  _He_  might be mad, oh yes,  _He_  might want to bite and tear out a tasty throat. But there’ll  _always_ be something in Him that wants to please. Please, please? Pretty please? He’s _just  a dog_ , a dog’s dog. Godgone dog. Dog. Gone.” The rant tapered off into a whisper-

“And now He’s just... gone.”

How was it possible for such random words to convey such desolation? So much desperation? Feeling his own heart break, Bruce tried to speak, force his thickening throat to move- say something that could stop the deluge of pain pouring out- but the mood suddenly changed again, quicksilver bullets and sinking tar; and Joker spun towards Bruce abruptly, advancing slyly, eyes suddenly cunning and coherent.

“I’m just a  _dog_ , you know. Sometimes, I’m a  _cute_  dog. Mostly-“

Bruce took a step back. “Don’t do this,” he says hoarsely. “You know.  _You know_  you’re  _NOT_  actually insane- goddamn you, _LISTEN to me!”_

He saw the metallic singing of switchblade slithering from the Joker’s sleeves, noted almost wildly that they were covered with chocolate sauce. The Joker’s advance was a tap dance, as mechanical and compelled as a marionette.

“JOKER-”

“- mad dog.” The Joker whispered again, almost apologetically, and the silver blades twirled once in an arch, like a circus master’s baton, and Bruce braced for their impact on his chest, refusing to close his eyes.

Then silence- and the absence of weight, and the wind’s caress, almost like a song. There was a haunted, too-sane look in the Joker’s face as they stared at Bruce with both blades suspended; each looking into the terrible understanding that mirrored in his adversary’s eyes.     

But before Bruce could reached out a beseeching hand, the Joker had twisted away again, leaped over the parapets and out onto the ledge of the roof, arms failing crazily in the air.

“Joker!”

“I’m just a  _mad_ dog,” the man on the ledge whispered in his own, slightly thin voice, sounding so normal and so heart-aching vulnerable. The blades glittered in his hands, as if the man was holding on to burning, white hot stars; and he looked down at Bruce with an expression that was cursed and terrified of what he was holding, but was even more terrified to let go.

Bruce watched his precarious balancing act on the narrow ledge, knowing that no matter which way he leaned, the fall down would be long and unforgiving. The heavy weight of their reality burned Bruce’s tongue, rendering him mute; it burned his eyes, forced him to blink its sudden hotness away. 

“Would you catch me, Batsy? Imperfect as I am? Yes, yes I believe you would.” The Joker’s voice became himself again; eyes glittering in the dark as if awash with unshed tears, and his smile was as fake as his swoon. “My – Dark – Knight.”

And he falls.

Bruce pitches forward, his heart choking in his throat. He wouldn’t be able to catch him, wouldn’t be able to save him- not again, not another-

Then a low, protracted cackle almost stopped his heart, followed by pulsing surges of relief warring with anger. He makes out a few shapes moving in the darkness- something billowy, tightly weaved against the buildings. A net of sorts. The clown’s lackeys, probably pulling him to safety.

 Something burned to ashes in Bruce’s mouth as he watched the proceedings. It had all been contrived. Nothing unanticipated. All a Big. Fat...

Joke.

Betrayed, but not surprised, Bruce picked up the scarred Stradivarius that the Joker had left behind, and examines the faded yellow smiley sticker that was pasted on the bridge. He cradles it one arm for long moments, before gentle placing it on the ledge. Its owner might come back for it, or he might not. Bruce knew it didn’t belong to him. He knew it certainly wasn’t a chocolate ball he could put into his pocket.

As he slips the Kevlar mask on, his eyes linger one last time at the rooftop with the crumbling chimneys, the scarred abandoned violin, the silver tissues of chocolate wrappers blowing in the wind. For a brief moment, a vague sense of loss weighted him down, numbed him with the knowledge that whatever madness it was that overtook them past few weeks, it was well and truly over, and somewhere, an invisible hand had already turned the hourglass over, the sand shifting through his helpless fingers.

He watched the dawn burn a thin red line on the city’s horizon, about to overcome the slumbering night and set the sky ablaze. With daylight would come normality, a time to shake off dreams and return to the cold light of reality.  

As the brief, balmy music of the night dissolved with the remaining darkness, Bruce turned away and faced the growing light , banishing forever the memory of a candlelit waltz that was well and truly over. The sounds of traffic and awakening industry felt like a fitting herald to the dawn of something tense and inexorable... the dawn of encroaching war. There would be so much,  _too_  much to do.

Batman walked away without another backward glance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story was written with a sequel in mind, known as 'Carmina Bellua' (Songs of War). Sadly, this sequel might be some time in coming due to another giant pie I'm current cooking up in the Avengers fandom, however, it will be published one day, so do subscribe to the SERIES button and not the story button if you wish to receive the updates then it finally comes out. 
> 
> Thank you for staying with me for the entirety of 'The Beguiling of Bruce Wayne'.


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